78 THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZONS. 



jesounded with the yelping of Whaiapu-sai pair of the Jaburu-moleque (Mycteria ameri- 

 monkeys. i went ashore with my gun and cana), a powerful bin! of the stork family, 

 got a glimpse of the fljck, but did not succeed four and a half feet in height, which flew uxi 

 in obtaining a specimen. They were of and alarmed the rest, so that I got only one 

 small size and covered with long fur of a bird out of the tumultuous flocks which 

 uniform gray color. I think the species was passed over our heads. Passing toward the 

 the Callithiix donacophilus. The rock com- farther end of the pool, I saw, resting on the 

 posing the elevated rklge of the Parentius is surface of the water, a number of large round 

 the same coarse iron-cemented conglomerate leaves, turned up at their edges ; they be- 

 which I have often spoken of as occurring longed Jo the Victoria water-lily. The leaves 

 mar Para and in seveial other places. Many were just beginning to expand (December 

 Joose blocks were scattered about. The for- 3d), some were still under water, and the 

 est was extremely varied, and inextricable largest of those which had reached the sur- 

 coils of woody climbers stretched from trefc face measured not quite three feet in diame- 

 to tree. Thongs of cacti were spread over ter. We found a montaria with a paddle in 

 1 he rocks and tree-trunks. The variety of it, drawn up on the bank, which I took leaf e 

 small, beautifully-shaped ferns, lichens, and to borrow of the unknown owner, and Luco 

 boleti made the place quite a museum of paddled me among the noble plants to search 

 cryptogamic plants. I found here two ex- f r flowers, meeting, however, with no sue- 

 quisite species of Longicorn beetles, and a cess - I learned afterward that the plant is 

 large kind of grasshopper (Pterochroza), common in nearly all the lakes of this neigh- 

 whose broad fore- wings resembled the leaf borhood. The natives call it the furno do 

 of a plant, providing the insect with a per- Piosoca, or oven of the Jacana, the shape of 

 feet disguise when they were closed ; while the leaves being like that of the ovens on 

 the hind wings were decorated with gayly- which mandioca-meal is roasted. We saw 

 colored eye-like spots. many kinds of hawks and eagles, one of 



The negro left us and turned up a narrow which, a black species, the Caiacara-i (Mil- 

 channel, the Parana-mirim dos Ramos (the vagonudicollis). sat on the top of a tall naked 

 little river of the branches, i.e., having many stump, uttering its hypocritical whining 

 ramifications), on the road to his home, 130 n tes. This eagle is considered a bird of ill 

 Iniles distant. We then continued our voy- omen by the Indians ; it often perches on the 

 ^ige, and in the evening arrived at Villa to P s f trees in the neighborhood of their 

 Nova, a straggling village containing about huts, and is then said to bring a warning of 

 seventy houses, many of which scarcely de- dath to some member of the household, 

 serve the name, being meie mud-huts roofed Others say that its whining cry is intended 

 with palm leaves. We stayed here four days, to attract other defenceless birds within its 

 The village is built, on a rocky bank, com- reach. The little courageous flycatcher 

 posed of the same coarse conglomerate as Bem-ti-vi (Saurophagus sulphuratus) assem- 

 that already so often mentioned. In some bles in companies of four or five, and attacks 

 places a bed of Tabatinga clay rests on the i* boldly, driving it from the perch where it 

 conglomerate. The soil in the neighboi hood would otherwise sit for hours. I shot three 

 Is sandy, and the forest, most of which ap- hawks of as many different species ; and 

 pears to be of second growth, is traversed by these, with a Magoary stork, two beautiful 

 broad alleys which terminate to the south gilded-green jacamars(Albulachalcocephala), 

 and east on the banks of pools and lakes, a an( ^ half a dozen leaves of the water-lily, 

 chain of which extends through the interior made a heavy load, with which we trudged 

 of the land. As soon as we anchored I set OJ ^ back to the canoe. 



off with Luco to explore the district. We A few years after this visit, namely, in 

 walked about a mile along the marly shore, 1854-5, I passed eight months at Villa Nova. 

 n which was a thick carpet of flowering The district of which it is the chief town is 

 shrubs, enlivened by a great variety of lovely ver y extensive, for it has about forty miles 

 little butterflies, and then entered the forest f linear extent along the banks of the river ; 

 Ijy a dry water-course. About a furlong in- but the whole does not contain more than 

 land this opened on a broad placid pool, 4000 inhabitants. More than half of these 

 whose banks, clothed with grass of the soft- are pure-blood Indians, who live in a senfi- 

 est green hue, sloped gently from the water's civilized condition on the banks of the nu- 

 c-dge to the compact wall of forest which en- merous channels and lakes. The trade of 

 compassed the whole. The pool swarmed the place is chiefly in india-rubber, balsam of 

 with water-fowl snowy egrets, dark-colored copaiba (which are collected on the banks of 

 striped herons, and storks of various species the Madeira and the numerous rivers that en- 

 standing in rows around its margins. Small ter the Canoma channel), and salt fish pre- 

 flocks of macaws were stirring about the top- pared in the dry season, nearer home. These 

 most branches of the trees. Long-legged articles are sent to Para in exchange for 

 piosocas (Parra Jaoana) stalked over the European goods. The few Indian and half- 

 water-plants on the surface of the pool, and breed families who reside in the town are 

 in the bushes on its margin were great num- many shades inferior in personal qualities 

 bers of a kind of canary (Sycalis brasiliensLs) and social condition to those I lived among 

 of a greenish -yellow color, which has a short near P ar * an d Camera. They live in 

 and not very melodious song. We had ad- wretched dilapidated mud-hovels ; the worn- 

 vanced but a few steps when we startled ft. eu cultivate small patches of nutndioca the 



