20 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
giant stork Mycteria Americana) were seen, but 
were too wary to be shot. 
June 15. — The river now reminds me of the 
Upper Rio Negro — similar banks sloping steeply 
to the water's edge, inundated in winter and clad 
with black rootlets. In many places the perpen- 
dicular cliffs of earth are speedily covered with 
rudimentary mosses. The little Oxalis also re- 
appears accompanied by patches of a grass and a 
small Composite herb. The wind has been very 
cool these two days, and in the morning actually 
cold. 
June 16. — This morning we passed, on the 
north bank, a line of cliffs about a quarter of a 
mile long, the upper 12 feet being red earth in 
scarcely distinguishable horizontal layers, while 
the remaining 20 feet were in distinct layers in- 
clined about 30' to the horizon. These were also 
of red earth, but in two places a few beds of 
greyish sandstone occurred. A little below the 
entrance to the pongo we came to a large clearing 
on the north bank, partially planted with Yucas 
and Plantains. 
Juite 17. — Soon after starting this morning we 
reached the pongo, where the river is much 
narrowed and confined in one channel by steep 
hills on each side. The margins were at first 
rocky, with large blocks irregularly scattered, soon 
changing to low walls of thick rock-strata. 
An hour and a half within this channel we came 
to streams of hot water, pouring in four or five 
slender rivulets from a black cliff perhaps 20 feet 
high and 20 or 30 yards from the river's margin. 
Each flowed in a slight hollow marked by vapour 
