BIVEE SCENERY. 153 



describe are before our eyes bears a character of truth and 

 individuality which gives attraction to things the least 

 important. 



On the 31st March a contrary wind obliged us to remain 

 on shore till noon. "We saw a part of some cane-fields laid 

 waste by the effect of a conflagration which had spread from 

 a neighbouring forest. The wandering Indians everywhere 

 set fire to the forest where they have encamped at night ; 

 and during the season of drought, vast provinces would be 

 the prey of these conflagrations if the extreme hardness of 

 the wood did not prevent the trees from being entirely 

 consumed. We found trunks of desmanthus and mahogany 

 which were scarcely charred two inches deep. 



Having passed the Diamante we entered a land inhabited 

 only by tigers, crocodiles, and chiguires; the latter are a 

 large species of the genus Cavia of Linnasus. We saw flocks 

 of birds, crowded so closely together as to appear against the 

 sky like a dark cloud which every instant changed its form. 

 The river widens by degrees. One of its banks is generally 

 barren and sandy from the effect of inundations ; the other 

 is higher, and covered with lofty trees. In some parts the 

 river is bordered by forests on each side, and forms a 

 straight canal a hundred and fifty toises broad. The 

 manner in which the trees are disposed is very remarkable. 

 We first find bushes of SCMSO* forming a kind of hedge 

 four feet high, and appearing as if they had been clipped 

 by the hand of man. A copse of cedar, brazilletto, and 

 lignum-vit, rises behind this hedge. Palm-trees are rare ; 

 we saw only a few scattered trunks of the thorny piritu 

 and corozo. The large quadrupeds of those regions, the 

 jaguars, tapirs, and peccaries, have made openings in the 

 hedge of sauso which we have just described. Through 

 these the wild animals pass when they come to drink at the 

 river. As they fear but little the approach of a boat, we 

 had the pleasure of viewing them as they paced slowly 

 along the shore till they disappeared in the forest, which 

 they entered by one of the narrow passes left at intervals 

 between the bushes. These scenes, which were often re- 

 peated, had ever for me a peculiar attraction. The pleasure 



* Hermesia castaneifolia. This is a new genus, approaching tha 

 khornea of Swartz. 



