236 



A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 



many paths in the forest, and accompanies me in all my 

 botanizing excursions ; with the keen perceptions of a 

 person whose only training has been through the senses, 

 she is far quicker than I am in discerning the smallest 

 plant in fruit or flower, and now that she knows what I 

 am seeking, she is a very efficient aid. Nimble as a monkey, 

 she thinks nothing of climbing to the top of a tree to bring 

 down a blossoming branch ; and here, where many of the 

 trees shoot up to quite a height before putting out their 

 boughs, such an auxiliary is very important. The collec- 

 tions go on apace, and every day brings in new species ; 

 more than can be easily cared for, — far more than our artist 

 can find time to draw. Yesterday, among other specimens, 

 a hollow log was brought in, some two feet and a half in 

 length, and about three inches in diameter, crowded with 

 Anojas (a common fish here) of all sizes, from those 

 several inches long to the tiniest young. The thing was 

 so extraordinary that one would have been inclined tc 

 think it was prepared in order to be passed off as a curi- 

 osity, had not the fish been so dexterously packed into 

 the log from end to end, that it was impossible to get them 

 out without splitting it open, when they were all found 

 alive and in perfectly good condition. They could not 

 have been artificially jammed into the hollow wood, in 

 that way, without injuring them. The fishermen say that 

 this is the habit of the family : they are often found thus 

 crowded into dead logs at the bottom of the river, making 

 their nests as it were in the cavities of the wood.* 



October 14:th. — Mr. Agassiz has a corps of little boys 



* This species belongs to one of the subdivisions of the genus Auchenipte- 

 rus ; it is undeseribed, and Mr. Burkhardt has made five colored sketches of a 

 number of specimens of different sizes, varying in their markings. — L. A. 



