CHAPTER V. 



THE GUAMA AND CAPIM RIVERS. 



Natterer's Hunter, Luiz Birds and Insects Prepare for a Journey 

 First Sight of the Piroroco St. Domingo Senhor Calistro Slaves 

 and Slavery Anecdote Cane-field Journey into the Forest 

 Game Explanation of the Piror6co Return to Para Bell-birds 

 and Yellow Parrots. 



I HAD written to Mr. Miller to get me a small house at Nazard, 

 and I now at once moved into it, and set regularly to work in 

 the forest, as much as the showery and changeable weather 

 would allow me. An old Portuguese, who kept a kind of 

 tavern next door, supplied my meals, and I was thus enabled 

 to do without a servant. The boys in the neighbourhood soon 

 got to know of my arrival, and that I was a purchaser of all 

 kinds of "bichos." Snakes were now rather abundant, and 

 almost every day I had some brought me, which I preserved 

 in spirits. 



As insects were not very plentiful at this season, I wished to 

 get a hunter to shoot birds for me, and came to an arrange- 

 ment with a Negro named Luiz, who had had much experience. 

 He had been with Dr. Natterer during the whole of his 

 seventeen years' residence in Brazil, having been purchased by 

 him in Rio de Janeiro when a boy ; and when the doctor left 

 Para", in 1835, ne g ave nmi ms freedom. His whole occupation 

 while with Dr. Natterer was shooting and assisting to skin birds 

 and animals. He had now a little land, and had saved enough 

 to purchase a couple of slaves himself, a degree of providence 

 that the less careful Indian seldom attains to. He is a native 

 of Congo, and a very tall and handsome man. I agreed to 

 give him a milrei (25. 3^.) a day and his living. He used to 

 amuse me much by his accounts of his travels with the doctor, 

 as he always called Natterer. He said he treated him very 



