36 



WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



have to tread on sliarp stones, most of them lying 

 edgewise. 



The ground gone over these two last days, seems con- 

 demned to perpetual solitude and silence. There was 

 not one four-footed animal to be seen, nor even the 

 marks of one. It would have been as silent as mid- 

 night, and all as stiU and unmoved as a monument, 

 had not the jabiru in the marsh, and a few vultures 

 soaring over the mountain's top, shown that it was not 

 quite deserted by animated nature. There were no 

 insects, except one kind of fly, about one-fourth the 

 size of the common house-fly. Tt bit cruelly, and was 

 much more tormenting than the mosquito on the sea- 

 coast. 



This seems to be the native country of the Arrow- 

 root. Wherever you passed through a patch 

 of wood in a low situation, there you found 

 it growing luxuriantly. 



The Indian place you are now at is not the proper 

 place to have come to, in order to reach the Portuguese 

 frontiers. You have advanced too much to the west- 

 ward. But there was no alternative. The ground 

 betwixt you and another small settlement (which was 

 the right place to have gone to) was overflowed ; and 

 thus, instead of proceeding southward, you were obliged 

 to wind along the foot of the western hills, quite out 

 of your way. 



Eut the grand landscape this place aflbrds, makes 

 you ample amends for the time you have spent in 

 reaching it. It would require great descriptive powers 

 to give a proper idea of the situation these people have 

 chosen for their dwelling. 



The hill they are on is steep and high, and full of 



