v.] REMARKABLE LEAVES. 91 



variety of lovely little butterflies, and then entered 

 the forest by a dry watercourse. About a furlong 

 inland this opened on a broad placid pool, whose 

 banks, clothed with grass of the softest green hue, 

 sloped gently from the water's edge to the compact 

 wall of forest which encompassed the whole. The 

 pool swarmed with water-fowl, snowy egrets, dark- 

 coloured striped herons, and storks of various species 

 standing in rows around its margins. Small flocks 

 of macaws were stirring about the topmost branches 

 of the trees. Long-legged piosocas (Parra jacana) 

 stalked over the water-plants on the surface of the 

 pool, and in the bushes on its margin were great 

 numbers of a kind of canary (Sycalis brasiliensis) of 

 a greenish yellow colour, which has a short and not 

 very melodious song. We had advanced but a few 

 steps when we startled a pair of the Jaburu-moleque 

 (Mycteria americand], a powerful bird of the stork 

 family, four and a half feet in height, which flew up 

 and alarmed the rest, so that I got only one bird out 

 of the tumultuous flocks which passed over our 

 heads. Passing towards the farther end of the pool, 

 I saw, resting on the surface of the water, a number 

 of large round leaves, turned up at their edges; they 

 belonged to the Victoria water-lily. The leaves were 

 just beginning to expand (December 3d), some were 

 still under water, and the largest of those which had 

 reached the surface measured not quite three feet in 

 diameter. We found a montaria with a paddle in it, 

 drawn up on the bank, which I took leave to borrow 

 of the unknown owner, and Luco paddled me 

 amongst the noble plants to search for flowers, meet- 



