WOODWORTH: GEOLOGICAL EXPEDITION TO BRAZIL AND CHILE. 23 
The day came off clear and fairly warm, giving from one or two of 
the trap elevations distant views to the north and south of level sky- 
lines broken only by an occasional remnant of a still higher basalt 
sheet in the series over which we were travelling. The surface past 
over this morning was one of rather immature relief with no deep, 
steep-sided gullies or ravines. Numerous small streams showed short 
falls over trap ledges and rapids of no great length, manifestations of 
streams actively at work and far from being well graded. While we 
were halted on the Rio das Pedras a troup of forty mules came along 
bound southward. After searching in the nests of quartz which 
here beset the decomposed trap for other minerals, we set out and 
went into camp for the night on a small rivulet (Rio Ponte alto) at the 
base of a steep trap slope surrounded by the araucarian forest. 
August 24th— A puma came into camp in the night at about 1 
o'clock and drove our dog into the tent. Alfredo fired twice at the 
glowing eyes of the animal but missed him. This is the sole instance 
in which on this expedition we were disturbed by any large nocturnal 
eat. During the day we saw nothing of the mammalian fauna of the 
forest. The tapir must be abundant in the deep recesses of the 
woods along the streams. We saw hanging on the wall of the store 
the skin of one which had been shot at the foot of the Serra do Espi- 
gao. After a ride of an hour and a half from camp we forded the river 
Marombas whose valley floor with a floodplain of some width lies 
fully 300 feet below the surrounding trap plateau. There is a small 
settlement of houses here in the garden of one of which I noted a palin 
tree and a large prickly pear cactus (Opuntia) about ten feet high. 
The road from this point onward crosses a succession of trap ridges 
and valleys, with a relief varying from 200 to 300 feet, as far as the 
broad elevation of cleared ground on which stands the pink and white 
village of Corytibanos. Here we halted for breakfast by a spring on 
the outskirts of the place and having rested on the warm dry grass and 
procured an additional supply of provisions including some bread and 
butter, proceeded southward along a mule path with bridges over 
small streams to a camp for the night. On the way we encountered 
in the south bank of a stream valley about 100 feet in thickness of red 
beds in a clayey state overlain by trap. Quartz in radiating nodules 
abounded in the trap traversed today, but little of geological interest 
could be noted in the monotonous ride over the basalt surface other 
than the minor variations of the topographic relief. Araucaria 
remained the dominant forest tree, while tree-ferns and bamboo could 
be seen near or along the water courses. Beside our camp, in the low 
