Chap. III. A NATURALIST'S OCCUPATION. 183 
by water in a small montaria, with an Indian lad to 
paddle. The neighbourhood yielded me, up to the last 
day of my residence, an uninterrupted succession of new 
and curious forms in the different classes of the animal 
kingdom, but especially insects. 
I lived, as may already have been seen, on the best of 
terms with the inhabitants of Ega. Eefined society, of 
course, there was none ; but the score or so of decent, 
quiet families which constituted the upper class of the 
place were very sociable ; their manners offered a curious 
mixture of naive rusticity and formal politeness ; the 
great desire to be thought civilised leads the most 
ignorant of these people (and they are all very ignorant, 
although of quick intelligence) to be civil and kind to 
strangers from Europe. I was never troubled with that 
impertinent curiosity on the part of the people in these 
interior places which some travellers complain of in 
other countries. The Indians and lower half-castes — at 
least such of them who gave any thought to the subject 
— seemed to think it natural that strangers should col- 
lect and send abroad the beautiful birds and insects of 
their country. The butterflies they universally con- 
cluded to be wanted as patterns for bright-coloured 
calico-prints. As to the better sort of people, I had no 
difficulty in making them understand that each Euro- 
pean capital had a public museum, in which were sought 
to be stored specimens of all natural productions in the 
mineral, animal, and vegetable kingdoms. They could 
not comprehend how a man could study science for its 
own sake ; but I told them I was collecting for the 
" Museo de Londres/' and was paid for it ; that was 
