184 



A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 



During our absence the commander of our steamer, 

 Captain Anacleto, and one or two gentlemen of the town, 

 among others Senhor Augustinho, and also Father Torquato, 

 whose name occurs often in Bates's work on the Amazons, 

 have been making a collection of river fishes, in which Mr. 

 Agassiz finds some fifty new species. Thus the harvest of 

 the week has been a rich one. To-day we are on our way 

 to Manaos, where we expect to arrive in the course of to- 

 morrow. 



yet their great variety astonished me, and still more was I struck by their 

 resemblance to Melanura, Umbra, and the Erythrinords. The presence of 

 Belone and allied forms also surprised me. Our stay on the shores of Jose 

 Assu and Lago Maximo was particularly instructive on account of the nu- 

 merous specimens of each species daily brought in by Laudigari and Maia. 

 It afforded me a welcome opportunity for studying the differences exhibited 

 by these fishes at different periods of life. No type passes, in that respect, 

 through greater changes than the Chromides, and among them the genus 

 Cychla is perhaps the most variable. I am sure that no ichthyologist could 

 at first sight believe that their young are really the early stage of the forms 

 known in our ichthyological works as Cychla monocolus, Cychla temensis, and 

 Cychla saxatilis. The males and females also vary greatly during the spawning 

 season, and the hump on the top of the head described as a specific character 

 in Cychla nigro-maculata is a protuberance only found in the male, swelling 

 during the period of spawning and soon disappearing. Once familiar with the 

 young brood of some species of Chromides, it became easy for me to distingui^ 

 a great variety of small types, no doubt hitherto overlooked by naturalists trav- 

 elling in this region, simply under the impression that they must be the young 

 of larger species. A similar investigation of the young of Serrasalma, 

 Myletes, Tetragonopterus, Cynodon, Anodus, &c. led me to the discovery 

 of an equally large number of diminutive types of Characines, many of which, 

 when full grown, do not exceed one inch in length ; among them are some of 

 the most beautiful fishes I have ever seen, so far as the brilliancy and variety 

 of their colors are concerned. Thus everything contributed to swell the collec- 

 tions, — the localities selected as well as the mode of investigating. I should 

 add here, that, several years before my own journey on the Amazons, I had 

 been indebted to the Rev. Mr. Fletcher for a valuable collection of fishes from 

 this and other Amazonian localities. The familiarity thus obtained with them 

 was very useful to me in pursuing my studies on the spot. — L. A. 



