226 



TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



reserved to himself the right of the chace ; it is 

 said to be inhabited by deer and wild boars, but 

 he has never yet paid it a visit. In countries 

 where the hunter is exposed not only to the attacks 

 of the beasts of prey, but also to poisonous ser- 

 pents and insects, and where the thickness of the 

 forest seldom allows him to remain on horseback, 

 to escape by that means the venomous animals 

 whom it is not easy to see, the chase has but few 

 attractions. A bear which the king received as a 

 present from Russia, is shown here as a curiosity. 

 It was upon an island exactly resembling these, 

 but which lies before the mouth of the bay, and is 

 called Ilha raza, that Sir Joseph Banks, when he 

 touched at Rio de Janeiro in the company of Cap- 

 tain Cook, discovered the beautiful Morcea North- 

 iana, which has since then become the ornament 

 of European gardens. The indefatigable Com- 

 merson, too, when Bougainville put into the har- 

 bour of Rio, botanised on these islands and the 

 adjacent continent ; we therefore here trod upon 

 a spot which had been rendered in a manner clas- 

 sical by the researches of those naturalists. The 

 traveller loves to connect his own pleasures with 

 those of his predecessors ; we were accordingly 

 very agreeably surprised when we found on those 

 islands among the bushes, the morasa ; and in the 

 hedges out of the town the beautiful shrub Bou- 

 gainvilUa brasiliensis, with its dazzling red flowers, 

 by which Commerson immortalised the name of 



