Like its congeners, it keeps together in small troops, and runs along the main boughs of the loftier trees, climbing perpendicular trunks, but never taking flying leaps. The locality seemed to be a poor one for birds and insects. I do not know how far this apparent scarcity is attributable to the rainy weather which prevailed, and to the unfavourable time of the year. The months spent here (from January to March) I always found to be the best for collecting Coleopterous insects in this climate, but they are not so well for other orders of insects or for birds, which abound most from July to October. )

The forest was very pleasant for rambling. In some directions broad pathways led down gentle slopes, through what one might fancy were interminable shrubberies of evergreens, to moist hollows where springs of water bubbled up, or shallow brooks ran over their beds of clean white sand. But the most beautiful road was one that ran through the heart of the forest to a waterfall, which the citizens of Barra consider as the chief natural curiosity of their neighbourhood. The waters of one of the large rivulets which traverse the gloomy wilderness here fall over a ledge of rock about ten feet high. It is not the cascade itself, but the noiseless solitude, and the marvellous diversity and richness of trees, foliage and flowers, encircling the water basin, that form the attraction of the place. Families make picnic excursions to this spot; and the gentlemen—it is said the ladies also—spend the sultry hours of midday bathing in the cold and bracing waters. ‘The place is classic ground to the naturalist, from having been a favourite spot with the celebrated travellers Spix and Martius, during their stay at Barra in 1820. Von Martius was so much impressed by its magical beauty, that he commemorated the visit by making a sketch of the scenery serve as a background in one of the plates of his great work on the palms. Birds and insects, however, were scarce amidst these charming sylvan scenes. I often traversed the whole distance from Barra to the waterfall, about two miles by the forest road, without seeing or hearing a bird, or meeting with so many as a score of Lepidopterous and Coleopterous insects. In the thinner woods near the borders of the forest many pretty little blue and green creepers of the Dacnidz group were daily seen feeding on berries, and a few very handsome birds occurred in the forest. But the latter were so rare that we could obtain them only by employing a native hunter, who used to spend a whole day and go a great distance to obtain two or three specimens. In this way I obtained amongst others specimens of the Trogon pavoninus (the Suruqua4 grande of the natives), a most beautiful creature, having soft golden-green plumage, red breast, and an orange-coloured beak; also the Ampelis Pompadoura, a rich glossy purple chatterer with wings of a snowy-white hue. Aniara sepulchralis, Agra znea, Stenocheila Lacordairei, and others, confirm this view, being common to Cayenne and the Rio Negro, but not found farther west on the banks of the Solimoens. Mr. Wallace discovered that the Rio Negro served as a barrier to the distribution of many species of mammals and birds, certain kinds being peculiar to the east, and others to the west bank (“ Travels on the Amazons and Rio Negro,” p. 471). The Upper Amazons Fauna, nevertheless, containsa very large proportion of Guiana species.

The borders of the forest yielded me more insects also than the shady central pathways. A few species occurred which I had previously found at Obydos and Serpa, but certain kinds were met with which are not known in any other part of South America. The small-leaved bushes and low trees on the skirts of the forest and along the more open pathways were sparingly tenanted by a variety of curious phytophagous beetles. None of these offered any remarkable feature, except perhaps the species of Chlamys. These are small beetles of a cubical shape and grotesque appearance, the upper surface of their bodies being studded with tubercles. They look like anything rather than insects: some of them are an exact imitation of the dung of caterpillars on leaves; others have a deceptive likeness to small flower-buds, galls, and other vegetable excrescences, whilst some large kinds are like fragments of metallic ore. They are very sluggish in their motions. and live in the most exposed situations on the surface of leaves; their curious shapes are therefore no doubt so many disguises to protect them from the keen eyes of insectivorous birds and lizards. A nearly allied group, the Lamprosomas, of which several species occurred in the same places, have perfectly smooth convex bodies; these glitter like precious stones on the foliage, and seem to be protected by the excessive hardness of their integuments. The Eumolpide and Galeru-cide, two groups belonging also to the leaf-eating family, were much more numerous than the Chlamydes and Lamprosomas, although having neither the disguised appearance of the one nor the hard integuments of the other; but many of them secrete a foul liquor when handled, which may perhaps serve the same purpose of passive defence. The Chlamydes are almost confined to the warmer parts of America, and the species, although extremely numerous (about three hundred are known in collections), are nearly all very rare. It is worthy of note that mimicking insects are very generally of great scarcity; that is, few examples of each species. occur in the places where they are found, and they constitute groups which are remarkable for the strongly-marked diversity and limited ranges of their species. After we had rested some weeks in Barra, we arranged our plans for further explorations in the interior of the country. Mr. Wallace chose the Rio Negro for his next trip, and I agreed to take the Solimoens. My colleague has already given to the world an account of his journey on the Rio Negro, and his adventurous ascent of its great tributary the Uapés. I left Barra for Ega, the first town of any importance on the Solimoens, on the 26th of March, 1850. The distance is nearly 40c miles, which we accomplished in asmall cuberta, manned by ten stout Cucama Indians, in thirty-five days. On this occasion, I spent twelve months in the upper region of the Amazons; circumstances then compelled me to return to Parad. I revisited the same country in 1855, and devoted three years and a half to fuller exploration of its natural productions. The results of both journeys will be given together in subsequent chapters of this work; in the meantime I will proceed to give an account of Santarem and the river Tapajos, whose neighbourhoods I investigated in the years 1851-4. 12

A few words on my visit to Para in 1851 may be here introduced. I descended the river from Ega to the capital, a distance of 1400 miles, in a heavily-laden schooner belonging to a trader of the former place. The voyage occupied no less than twenty-nine days, although we were favoured by the powerful currents of the rainy season. The hold of the vessel was filled with turtle oil contained in large jars, the cabin was crammed with Brazil nuts, and a great pile of salsaparilla, covered with a thatch of palm leaves, occupied the middle of the deck. We had therefore (the master and two passengers) but rough accommodation, having to sleep on deck, exposed to the wet and stormy weather, under little toldos or arched shelters, arranged with mats of woven lianas and maranta leaves. I awoke many a morning with clothes and bedding soaked through with the rain. With the exception, however, of a slight cold at the commencement, I never enjoyed better health than during this journey. When the wind blew from up river or off the land, we sped away at a great rate; but it was often squally from those quarters, and then it was not safe to hoist the sails. ‘The weather was generally calm, a motionless mass of leaden clouds covering the sky, and the broad expanse of waters flowing smoothly down with no other motion than the ripple of the current. When the wind came from below, we tacked down the stream; sometimes it blew very strong, and then the schooner, having the wind abeam, laboured through the waves, shipping often heavy seas which washed everything that was loose from one side of the deck to the other.

On arriving at Parad, I found the once cheerful and healthy city desolated by two terrible epidemics. The yellow fever, which visited the place the previous year (1850) for the first time since the discovery of the country, still lingered, after having carried off nearly 5 per cent. of the population. ‘The number of persons who were attacked, namely, three-fourths of the entire population, showed how general is the onslaught of an epidemic on its first appearance in a place. At the heels of this plague came the smallpox. The yellow fever had fallen most severely on the whites and mamelucos, the negroes wholly escaping; but the smallpox attacked more especially the Indians, negroes, and people of mixed colour, sparing the whites almost entirely, and taking off about a twentieth part of the population in the course of the four months of its stay. I heard many strange accounts of the yellow fever. I believe Parad was the second port in Brazil attacked by it. The news of its ravages in Bahia, where the epidemic first appeared, arrived some few days before the disease broke out. The government took all the sanitary precautions that could be thought of; amongst the rest was the singular one of firing cannon at the street corners, to purify the air. Mr. Norris, the American consul, told me the first cases of fever occurred near the port, and that it spread rapidly and regularly from house to house, along the streets which run from the waterside to the suburbs, taking about twenty-four hours to reach the end. Some persons related that for several successive evenings before the fever broke out the atmosphere was thick, and that a body of murky vapour, accompanied by a strong stench, travelled from street to street. This moving vapour was called the ‘“ Mai da peste” (“‘ the mother or spirit of

the plague”); and it was useless to attempt to reason them out of the belief that this was the forerunner of the pestilence. The progress of the disease was very rapid. It commenced in April, in the middle of the wet season. Ina few days, thousands of persons lay sick, dying, or dead. The state of the city during the time the fever lasted may be easily imagined. ‘Towards the end of June it abated, and very few cases occurred during the dry season from July to December.

As I said before, the yellow fever still lingered in the place when I arrived from the interior in April. I was in hopes I should escape it, but was not so fortunate; it seemed to spare no new-comer. At the time I fell ill, every medical man in the place was worked to the utmost in attending the victims of the other epidemic; it was quite useless to think of obtaining their aid, so I was obliged to be my own doctor, as I had been in many former smart attacks of fever. I was seized with shivering and vomit at nine o’clock in the morning. Whilst the people of the house went down to the town for the medicines I ordered, I wrapped myself in a blanket and walked sharply to and fro along the verandah, drinking at intervals a cup of warm tea, made of a bitter herb in use amongst the natives, called Pajémaridba, a leguminous plant grow-in all waste places. About an hour afterwards I took a good draught of a decoction of elder blossoms as a sudorific, and soon after fell insensible into my hammock. Mr. Philipps, an English resident with whom I was then lodging, came home in the afternoon and found me sound asleep and perspiring famously. I did not wake till towards midnight, when I felt very weak and aching in every bone of my body. I then took as a purgative a small dose of Epsom salts and manna. In forty-eight hours the fever left me, and in eight days from the first attack I was able to get about my work. Little else happened during my stay which need be recorded here. I shipped off all my collections to England, and received thence a fresh supply of funds. It took me several weeks to prepare for my second and longest journey into the interior. My plan now was first to make Santarem headquarters for some time, and ascend from that place the river Tapajos, as far as practicable. Afterwards I intended to revisit the marvellous country of the Upper Amazons, and work well its natural history at various stations I had fixed upon, from Ega to the foot of the Andes.

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