Insects. 2837 



shall I begin to describe this strange and wonderful country ? Since 

 we have been here we have been overwhelmed with the vast compli- 

 cation and abundance of the subjects we are come to investigate, and 

 not a little confused by the strangeness of the language, the manners, 

 mixture of races, and novel occupations of the people : the city is in 

 a constant state of confusion from the rollicking propensities and re- 

 ligious amusements of the people ; fireworks, noisy music, processions, 

 and jingling of bells, have been going forward almost every morning 

 and evening. The climate is most delicious ; the thermometer is 

 about 78° or 79° at sunrise, about 86° at theh ottest part of the day, and 

 81° and 82° in the evening; the mornings are most charmingly fine, 

 but we get a smart shower in the afternoon about once in three days, 

 this being the last of the rainy months. We sleep at night in ham- 

 mocks, with no other covering than a sheet, and the windows of our 

 rooms open ; at sunrise we walk out in our night-shirts into the fresh 

 air, strip naked and wash. I am out in the sun all hours of the day 

 without inconvenience, and wade through bogs, ramble through the 

 moist woods, sail in canoe, and undergo all sorts of exposure with 

 impunity, and have an amazing appetite. All Europeans enjoy 

 good health here : the healthfulness of the place is a matter of the 

 greatest astonishment to me, for the city is surrounded by marshes and 

 ditches flooded at high water, and left bare and muddy at low tide. 

 On first landing, the exuberance of life everywhere burst upon us at 

 once ; in the streets, a moist, hot, earthy smell arose, and on the walls, 

 scores of lizards were scampering about. The city consists of about 

 a score of horribly paved streets ; beyond these, are most magically 

 beautiful lanes fringed with palms, and utterly overgrown with most 

 magnificent foliage : beyond these lanes are coffee shrubberies, and 

 scattered cottages embosomed in them, each with a clump of bananas, 

 and orange-trees overhanging : and still further on, the shrubberies 

 merge into the original and impenetrable forest, this about two miles 

 from the city. There are about 20,000 idle, jovial, and luxurious in- 

 habitants ; yet I see scarcely any signs of cultivation : the earth and 

 river produce all the necessaries of life spontaneously. The Euro- 

 pean merchants and planters (which latter are very few) complain of 

 the dearness of labour, and the impossibility of making the extraordi- 

 nary riches of the country available. 



" Where are the dangers and horrors of the tropics ? I find none of 



them. Of snakes I have seen one, in an open common, and another, 



a Boa 15 feet long, which was being dragged through the streets by 



some Indians. The fact is, that every creature is so active and sensi- 



VIII 2 D 



