INHABITANTS— THE BOTOCUDOS. 163 



ally in the southern parts of Bahia, are entirely destitute of vegetation and covered 

 with saline efflorescences. 



In their general features the flora and fauna differ in no respects from those 

 of the neighbouring provinces. But some of the species are confined to limited 

 areas, and many of the fiohes of the Upper S. Francisco ar^e quite different from 

 those of the lower reaches below the falls. Minas Geraes and Bahia, like Ceara 

 and Piauhy, had a far richer fauna characterised by huge quadrupeds in a 

 relatively recent epoch than at present. In the neighbourhood of Lagoa Santa, 

 Lund and other naturalists have discovered in about 1,000 caves as many as 

 115 species of fossil mammals, whereas the living fauna no longer comprises more 

 than 88 altogether. Amongst the extinct animals, Lund describes a great ape, 

 an enormous jaguar twice the size of the present Brazilian " tiger," a cabiai as big 

 as a tapir, a horse greatly resembling our modern horse, and a llama like that of 

 Peru. 



Inhabitants. 



Human remains also are found in the caves of Minus Geraes, where Lund has 

 discovered the fossil bones of at least thirty persons of all ages, From his com- 

 parative study of these remains he infers that the race to which they belonged 

 was identical in its general type with that by which it was occupied at the time 

 of the discovery. The most striking feature of the Lagoa Santa skulls is the 

 narrowness of the receding forehead, like that of the figures carved by the Mayas 

 on the Palenque monuments. The cheek-bones also are very prominent, while the 

 incisors have a broad flat surface like that of the molars. To judge from their 

 small brain-pan, the natives of the Upper S. Francisco basin must have possessed 

 a low degree of intelligence. The eoriscos, or stone axes, often picked up in the 

 country, exactly resemble those of European collections in form and substance. 



The natives of the coastlands, with whom the discoverers first came into friendly 

 or hostile contact, belonged to the Ges family. The Tupi, most civilised of all 

 the aborigines, applied to these coastlanders the depreciative term Tapuya, 

 " Strangers " or " Barbarians." This is the same word that, under the slightly 

 modified form of Tapnyo, is now applied collectively to all the Indians living at 

 peace with the Brazilians. 



Of the Ges family the best known representatives are the famous Burungs, 

 better known as Botocudos, from the hofoque or wooden disc worn by them iu 

 the under lip and in the ear-lobes. They also take the name of Aimores, which 

 has been extended to the mountains dominating their territory. Some ethnologists 

 class the Botocudos in a separate family.* 



The nomad survivors of the ancient Aimores have their camping-grounds on 

 the banks of the Mucury, Doce, and other coast streams and in the forests of the 

 Atlantic slope of Minas Geraes. About 1830 they still numbered some 14,000 ; 



* A. H. Keane, On the Botocudos, 1883, p. 5. 



