Chap. IV. THE CIGANA FOWL. 119 



The plantations of mandiocca are always scattered about 

 in the forest, some of them being on islands in the 

 middle of the river. Land being plentiful, and the 

 plough, as well as, indeed, nearly all other agricultural 

 implements, unknown, the same ground is not planted 

 three years together ; but a new piece of forest is cleared 

 every alternate year, and the old clearing suffered to 

 relapse into jungle. 



We stayed here two days, sleeping ashore in the 

 apartment devoted to strangers. As usual in Brazilian 

 houses of the middle class, we were not introduced to 

 the female members of the family, and, indeed, saw 

 nothing of them except at a distance. In the forest 

 and thickets about the place we were tolerably suc- 

 cessful in collecting, finding a number of birds and 

 insects which do not occur at Para. I saw here, for the 

 first time, the sky-blue Chatterer (Ampelis cotinga). It 

 was on the topmost bough of a very lofty tree, and com- 

 pletely out of the reach of an ordinary fowling-piece. 

 The beautiful light-blue colour of its plumage was 

 plainly discernible at that distance. It is a dull, quiet 

 bird. A much commoner species was the Cigana or Gipsy 

 (Opisthocomus cristatus), a bird belonging to the same 

 order, Gallinacea, as our domestic fowl. It is about the 

 size of a pheasant ; the plumage is dark bro^vn, varied 

 with reddish, and the head is adorned with a crest of long 

 feathers. It is a remarkable bird in many respects. The 

 hind toe is not placed high above the level of the other 

 toes, as it is in the fowl-order generally, but lies on the 

 same plane with them ; the shape of the foot becomes 

 thus suited to the purely arboreal habits of the bird, en- 



