228 TRAVELS ON THE iiio NEGRO. \_Becember, 
At the village I spent nearly a fortnight more, getting 
together a good many small birds, but nothing very 
rare. I shot a specimen of the curious bald-headed 
brown crow {G^mnocephalm calvus), which, though com- 
mon in Cayenne, is very rare in the Rio Negro district ; 
nobody, in fact, but the Indians, had ever seen the bird, 
and they regarded it as my greatest curiosity. I also 
skinned a black agouti, and, made drawings of many 
curious fish. 
The Padre having come to Guia, most of the Indians 
returned with me to attend the festa, and get their 
children baptized. When we arrived, however, we found 
that he had left for the villages higher up, and was to 
call on his return. I now wished to set off as soon as 
possible for the Upper Rio Negro, in Venezuela; but of 
course no Indian could be got to go with me till the 
Padre returned, and I was obliged to wait patiently and 
idly at Guia. Por days I would go out into the forest,' 
and not get a bird worth skinning ; insects were equally ; 
scarce. The forest was gloomy, damp, and silent as | 
death. Every other day was wet, and almost every af- 
ternoon there was a thunder-storm; and on these dull 
days and weary evenings, I had no resource but the oft- 
told tales of Senhor L., and the hackneyed conversation 
on buying and selling calico, on digging salsa, and cutting 
piassaba. 
At length however the Padre, Frei Joze, arrived with 
Senhor Tenente Filisberto, the Commandante of Marabi- 
tanas. Frei Joze dos Santos Innocentos was a tall, thin, f 
prematurely old man, thoroughly worn out by everyjt 
kind of debauchery, his hands crippled, and his body 
