TRAVELS ON THE AMAZON. 
16 
birds common in the suburbs of Para. In the forest are 
constantly heard the curious notes of the bush-shrikes, 
tooo-too-to-to-t-t-t, each succeeding sound quicker and 
quicker, like the successive reboundings of a hammer 
from an anvil. In the dusk of the evening many goat- 
suckers fly about and utter their singular and melancholy 
cries. One says Whip-poor-will,’’ just like the North 
American bird so called, and another with remarkable 
distinctness keeps asking, Who are you and as their 
voices often alternate, an interesting though rather mo- 
notonous conversation takes place between them. 
The climate, so far as we had yet experienced, was 
delightful. The thermometer did not rise above 87° in 
the afternoon, nor sink below 74° during the night. 
The mornings and evenings were most agreeably cool, 
and we had generally a shower and a fine breeze in the 
afternoon, which was very refreshing and purified the air. 
On moonlight evenings till eight o’clock ladies walk 
about the streets and suburbs without any head-dress 
and in ball-room attire, and the Brazilians, in their rosi- 
nhas, sit outside their houses bare-headed and in their 
shirt-sleeves till nine or ten o’clock, quite unmindful of 
the night aus and heavy dews of the tropics, which we 
have been accustomed to consider so deadly. 
We will now add a few words on the food of the 
people. Beef is almost the only meat used. The cattle 
are kept on estates some days’ journey across and up 
the river, whence they are brought in canoes ; they 
refuse food during the voyage, and so lose most of their 
fat, and arrive in very poor condition. They are killed 
in the morning for the day’s consumption, and are cut 
