Natural-History Collectors. 5017 



traffic, I should think, scarcely pays for coal and grease. I was for- 

 tunate in my voyage, performing it just in the ' nick' of time to escape 

 two very grave inconveniences : one was the cholera, which broke out 

 at Para, and the next steamer after my voyage suffered horribly; eleven 

 men died in the eight days' journey from Para to Barra: the other in- 

 convenience was the Upper Amazon steamer, which, a few days after 

 depositing me at Ega, got aground on a" sand-bank, the river sinking 

 at the time, so that she remained high and dry for about five weeks, 

 the passengers having to descend in an open boat to Barra. I am 

 sincerely thankful for my good fortune in landing in health and safety, 

 with all my baggage perfectly sound, and in being able to begin my 

 rambles in these glorious forests two days afterwards. 



" I arrived on the 19th of June, so that I have been here about two 

 months, and have collected 2600 chosen insects, besides a few land- 

 shells, &c. There is a wonderful difference in the general run of 

 species between this place and Santarem ; in fact, with the exception 

 of a very few, common everywhere, the whole insect Fauna is changed : 

 the soil is different, the forests are composed of quite a different class 

 of trees/ but there is no place on the Lower Amazons that can at all 

 be compared with Ega, in its exuberant fertility, — rich, fat, black soil, — 

 teeming waters, and hence towering forests. When I arrived the river 

 had just begun to ebb ; in a week or two there was sufficient sandy 

 beach exposed for the Megacephalse to come out, so I commenced my 

 labours in that department : the first thing I found was M. curta, 

 Reiche, very few ; then one or two of a smaller species nearly allied 

 to it; these both disappeared when the sandy beach was further ex- 

 posed, and I began to take the very curious M. quadricollis, Laporte ; 

 soon afterwards appeared M. Klugii, and, in company with it, 

 M. bifasciata, Brulle, and M. laminata, Perty ? I find that the Ega 

 M. bifasciata is the true one, according to Westwood's description, 

 and the allied species common at Santarem is a distinct species, 

 perhaps M. cruciata, Brulle ; examine them for yourself: you 

 will find the Ega species, besides differing in size and colour, has a 

 capital character in the sutural apices of the elytra, which are divergent 

 and produced, whilst in the Santarem species they form simple right 

 angles; this is a character Westwood has overlooked. I have made 

 another observation very similar: there are two species confounded 

 under M. laminata ; the one I took at Santarem is larger, darker and 

 much more pubescent and punctured on disk of thorax than the one I 

 take here (Ega). I do not expect to find any new Megacephalae here ; 

 but shortly I shall take a trip further up, and hope to find several." 

 XIV. N 



