THE CIGANA FOWL 



79 



with fruit-trees, orange, lemon, genipapa, goyava, and 

 others ; and beyond this, a broad path through a ne- 

 glected plantation of coffee and cacao, led to several 

 large sheds, where the farinha, or mandioca meal, was 

 manufactured. The plantations of mandioca are always 

 scattered about in the forest, some of them being on 

 islands in the middle of the river. Land being plentiful, 

 and the plough, as well as, indeed, nearly all other agri- 

 cultural implements, unknown, the same ground is not 

 planted three years together ; but a new piece of forest 

 is cleared every alternate year, and the old clearing 

 suffered to relapse into jungle. 



We stayed here two days, sleeping ashore in the apart- 

 ment devoted to strangers. As usual in Brazilian houses 

 of the middle class, we were not introduced to the female 

 members of the family, and, indeed, saw nothing of them 

 except at a distance. In the forest and thickets about 

 the place we were tolerably successful in collecting, 

 finding a number of birds and insects which do not occur 

 at Para. I saw here, for the first *time, the sky-blue 

 Chatterer (Ampelis cotinga). It was on the topmost 

 bough of a very lofty tree, and completely out of the 

 reach of an ordinary fowling-piece. The beautiful light 

 blue colour of its plumage was plainly discernible at that 

 distance. It is a dull, quiet bird. A much commoner 

 species was the Cigana or Gipsy (Opisthocomus cristatus), 

 a bird belonging to the same order, Gallinacea, as our 

 domestic fowl. It is about the size of a pheasant ; the 

 plumage is dark brown, varied with reddish, and the 

 head is adorned with a crest of long feathers. It is a 

 remarkable bird in many respects. The hind toe is not 

 placed high above the level of the other toes, as it is in 

 the fowl-order generally, but lies on the same plane with 

 them ; the shape of the foot becomes thus suited to the 

 purely arboreal habits of the bird, enabling it to grasp 

 firmly the branches of trees. This is a distinguishing 

 character of all the birds in equinoctial America which 

 represent the fowl and pheasant tribes of the old world, 

 and affords another proof of the adaptation of the Fauna 

 to a forest region. The Cigana lives in considerable 

 flocks on the lower trees and bushes bordering the streams 

 and lagoons, and feeds on various wild fruits, especially 

 the sour Goyava (Psidium sp.). The natives say it de- 

 vours the fruit of arborescent Arums (Caladium arbore- 



