VALLEY OF THE AMAZONS. 
185 
might be seen grazing in the adjoining fields. 
Along the river-banks, where the country 
is chiefly open, with extensive low marshy 
grounds, the only palm to be seen is the Ma- 
raja. After keeping along the Rio Gurupa- 
tuba for some distance, we turned to the right 
into a narrow stream, which has the charac¬ 
ter of an Igarape * in its lower course, though 
higher up it drains the country between the 
serra of Errerd and that of Tajury, and assumes 
the appearance of a small river. It is named 
after the serra, and is known as the Rio 
ErrerA This stream, narrow and picturesque, 
and often so overgrown with capim that the 
canoe pursued its course with difficulty, passed 
through a magnificent forest of the beautiful 
fan-palm, called here the Miriti (Mauritia flex - 
uosa'). This forest stretched for miles, over¬ 
shadowing a kind of underbrush, formed of 
many smaller trees and innumerable shrubs, 
some of which bore bright, conspicuous flowers. 
It seemed to me a strange spectacle,—a forest 
of monocotyledonous trees with a dicotyledo¬ 
nous undergrowth; the inferior plants thus 
tow T ering above and sheltering the superior 
* Water-path in the forest. 
