494 NATUKAL HISTORY OF 



establishment, and who was extremely anxious to show us 

 all attention, endeavouring to make the utmost use of a 

 very few English words which he proved to be possessed of, 

 on making his appearance, demonstrating to us that he 

 understood the directions he had received the night before 

 — announcing " breakfast ten clocks," " dinner four clocks," 

 " to-morrow five clocks," shaking me by the shoulder at the 

 same time, to convey to us the impression that he would 

 rouse us at that hour ; " six clocks, Entre Eios," meaning 

 that the coach started then for that place. He, moreover, 

 succeeded in explaining to us that after breakfast he would 

 conduct us to the celebrated chacara, by pointing to Dr. 

 Campbell, himself, and myself, and announcing " Mariano 

 chacara lookee." After breakfast we were disappointed 

 to find that heavy rain was falling. Fortunately, however, 

 this state of things did not last long, and we took a stroll 

 in the outskirts of the town, observing in a marsh hundreds 

 of specimens of the British royal fern, Osmunda regalis, 

 growing. After a time we set out with our friend, who had 

 attired himself gorgeously for the occasion, and managed to 

 carry on a large amount of conversation with him by our 

 reciprocally mentioning the English and Portuguese names 

 of the various objects we saw. After a short parley with a 

 little negro boy who acted as porter at the gate of the chacara, 

 we entered the grounds, which we found to be very tastefully 

 laid out, and well kept. There was a small menagerie, 

 including a cage of monkeys and several other mammalia, and 

 a variety of birds, among which were some fine Curassows, 

 and a specimen of the Agami {Psophia crepitans), which 

 stalked up to the. front of its cage to contemplate us, 

 emitting its very curious drumming note. After leaving 

 the grounds, and stopping for a few minutes at a venda, 



