248 



TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



appearing nearer or more remote according to the 

 position of the songster, fill the wanderer with 

 astonishment. While thus every living creature 

 by its actions and voice greets the splendour of the 

 day, the delicate humming-birds*, rivalling, in 

 beauty andlustre, diamonds, emeralds, and sapphires, 

 hover round the brightest flowers. When the sun 

 goes down most of the animals retire to rest ; 

 only the slender deer, the shy pecari, the timid 

 agouti, and the tapir t still graze around ; the nasua 

 and the opossum, the cunning animals of the 

 feline racet, steal through the obscurity of the 

 wood watching for prey, till at last the howling 

 monkeys, the sloth with a cry as of one in dis- 

 tress, the croaking frogs, and the chirping grass- 

 hoppers with~ their monotonous note, conclude 

 the day ; the cries of the macuc, the capueira, 

 the goat-sucker §, and the bass tones of the bull- 

 frog announce the approach of night. Myriads 

 of luminous beetles now begin to fly about like 



* Trocliilus ornatuS; MangOj Maugaeus, leucogaster, viri- 

 dissimus, mellisugus, amethystinus, hirundinaceus nob., crispus, 

 pygmaeus, brevicauda, albo-gularis, leucopygius, Helios, Mystax 

 nob. ; Grypus ruficollis nob. 



f Cervus mexicanus ; Coelogenys Paca ; Dasyprocta Agouty, 

 Acuschy ; Cavia aperea ; Lepus brasiliensis ; Tapirus ameri - 

 canus, var. rufa. 



J Nasua Quasie, rufa ; Didelphis cayopollin ; Felis onca, 

 discolor, 



§ Bradypus tridactylus ; Tinamus noctivagus Neuw. ; Per- 

 dix guyaaensis ; Caprimulgus albicollis. 



