118 WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



must sleep in the forest; the path is not so good the fol- 

 lowing day. The hills over which it lies are rocky, steep, 

 and rugged, and the spaces betwixt them swampy, and 

 mostly knee-deep in water. After eight hours' walk you 

 find two or three Indian huts, surrounded by the forest ; 

 and in little more than half an hour from these you come 

 to ten or twelve others, where you pass the night. They 

 are prettily situated at the entrance into a savanna. The 

 eastern and western hills are still covered with wood ; but 

 on looking to the south-west quarter you perceive it be- 

 gins to die away. In these forests you may find plenty 

 of the trees which yield the sweet-smelling resin called 

 Acaiari, and which, when pounded and burnt on charcoal, 

 gives a delightful fragrance. 



From hence you proceed, in a south-west direction, 

 through a long swampy savanna. Some of the hills 

 which border on it have nothing but a thin coarse grass 

 and huge stones on them ; others quite wooded ; others 

 with their summits crowned, and their base quite bare ; 

 and others, again, with their summits bare, and their base 

 in thickest wood. 



Half of this day's march is in water, nearly up to the 

 knees. There are four creeks to pass : one of them has a 

 fallen tree across it. You must make your own bridge 

 across the other three. Probably, were the truth known, 

 these apparently four creeks are only the meanders of one. 

 The Jabiru, the largest bird in Guiana, feeds in the 

 marshy savanna through which you have just passed. He 

 is wary and shy, and will not allow you to get within 

 gun-shot of him. 



You sleep this night in the forest, and reach an Indian 

 settlement about three o'clock the next evening, after 

 walking one-third of the way through wet and miry 



ground. 



1 O 



