NOTES ON BOTANY. 411 



appeared, which was continually discharging, the muscles became 

 hard, swelled, and painful, and I realized at length that it must 

 be a berno. I had heard from my friends the cruel practice of 

 the natives in applying a burning stick to the wound to kill the 

 worm, so I determined to keep silent about it ; and I did not care 

 to use mercurial ointment or tobacco-water, for fear that the 

 remedy might be worse than the disease. At length the pain 

 became unbearable at certain intervals, when I presume the crea- 

 ture was feeding. Probing the wound with a long darning-needle, 

 it penetrated over an inch before I felt the creature at the end 

 of his burrow. I squeezed the berno out alive, and it turned out 

 to be a very large maggot, three-quarters of an inch long and a 

 quarter of an inch in diameter. From the sufferings which that 

 solitary specimen caused me, I can understand how miserable my 

 poor dog must have been, as his back was a mass of sores. It 

 was pitiful to see him. When running about he would turn round 

 every minute with a whine to bite his wounds till they were raw. 

 He also suffered much from bichos do pe. 



NOTES ON BOTANY. 



As is well known, the flora of the high table-lands in Brazil 

 may be separated into two distinct divisions : i. That of the 

 valleys and watersheds. 2. That of the campos. 



Far more marked are these differences than any that exist in 

 our country between the plants of the valleys and mountains or 

 plateaux around. But I must confine myself to a few superficial 

 remarks. I had no opportunity of visiting the country beyond the 

 intricate system of watersheds of the Rios Para and Paraopeba, 

 except one ride to within thirty miles of Pitanguy, where the 

 strata change considerably. The various divides of the watershed 

 are all about the same level, three thousand to three thousand 

 two hundred feet, with an isolated mass of considerable extent 

 (the Serra de Cortume). I have given sketches of this mass of hills 

 from two points : from Casa Grande looking eastwards, and from 

 the valley of the Rio Camapuao * looking southwards. This 

 serra may be about five thousand feet high. To the southward, the 



* Pronounced Camapuang. 



