CHAP. IV] RAINY SEASON SETS IN 105 



contains many species which seem to be survivals from 

 a very remote geologic past, whose kinsfolk have perished 

 under the changed conditions of recent ages ; and in the 

 case of many, like the hoatzin and screamer, their like is 

 not known elsewhere. Herons of many species swarmed 

 in this neighbourhood. The handsomest was the richly 

 coloured tiger bittern. Two other species were so unlike 

 ordinary herons that I did not recognize them as herons 

 at all until Cherrie told me what they were. One had 

 a dark body, a white-speckled or ocellated neck, and 

 a bill almost like that of an ibis. The other looked 

 white, but was really mauve-coloured, with black on 

 the head. When perched on a tree, it stood like an 

 ibis ; and instead of the measured wing-beats charac- 

 teristic of a heron's flight, it flew with a quick, vigorous 

 flapping of the wings. There were queer mammals, too, 

 as well as birds. In the fields Miller trapped mice of a 

 kind entirely new. 



Next morning the sky was leaden, and a drenching 

 rain fell as we began our descent of the river. The 

 rainy season had fairly begun. For our good fortune 

 we were still where we had the cabins aboard the boat, 

 and the ranch-house, in which to dry our clothes and 

 soggy shoes ; but in the intensely humid atmosphere, 

 hot and steaming, they stayed wet a long time, and 

 were still moist when we put them on again. Before 

 we left the house where we had been treated with such 

 courteous hospitality — the finest ranch-house in Matto 

 Grosso, on a huge ranch where there are some sixty 

 thousand head of horned cattle — the son of our host, 

 Dom Joao the younger, the jaguar-hunter, presented 

 me with two magnificent volumes on the palms of 

 Brazil, the work of Doctor Barboso Rodriguez, one- 

 time director of the Botanical Gardens at Rio Janeiro. 



