TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



309 



afterwards invited us to view the church, which is 

 only half finished, and loaded with tasteless wooden 

 ornaments. It was handsomely lighted up, and 

 adorned with a manger, in which the infant Christ 

 lay. There was something affecting in this em- 

 blematical custom in this place, because we dwelt 

 with pleasure on the idea that the doctrine of 

 salvation had found its way into these lonely, 

 beautifully wild tracts. Since we had descended 

 from the mountains into the valley, the physiognomy 

 of the landscape had changed more and more, 

 and the difference in its character became more 

 independent and unmixed, the farther we removed 

 from the dark primeval forests of the Serra do Mar. 

 From this place the road lay in the broad valley of 

 the Paraiba, over low hills, which, in the begirming, 

 we found covered with all kinds of dwarf bushes 

 and single trees ; but farther on it became opener, 

 and clothed with grasses and herbs, or with long 

 rows of ananas. Herds of mules and horned cattle 

 were grazing in these pleasant tracts. The Bra- 

 zilian distinguishes the two principal forms in the 

 physiognomy of the vegetable world, wood and 

 plain, by the names of Matto and Campo j but 

 they have many other names for the numerous 

 varieties of the latter, which determine, more or 

 less, the local character of the landscape. The 

 greater part of the valley of the Paraiba is covered 

 with pastures (campos), which descend from the 

 eminences, and are but seldom broken by low 



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