Cuap. VIII. TREES OF THE CAMPOS. I9l

localities, distils in a similar way an oil of the most vecherché fragrance. The yield, however, is very small. The native women esteem it highly as ascent.. To obtain a supply of the precious liquid, large strips of bark are loosened and pieces of cotton left in soak underneath. By visiting the tree daily, and pressing the oil from the cotton. a small phial containing about an ounce may be filled in the course of a month. One of the most singular of the vegetable productions of the campos is the Sticu-tiba tree (Plumieria phagedzenica). It grows in the greatest luxuriance in the driest parts, and with its long, glossy, dark-green leaves, fresh and succulent even in the most arid seasons, and white jasmine-like flowers, forms the greatest decoration of these solitary places. The bark, leaves, and leaf-stalks, yield a copious supply of milky sap, which the natives use very generally as plaster in local inflammation, laying the liquid on the skin with a brush, and covering the place with cotton. I have known it to work a cure in many cases; but, perhaps, the good effect is attributable to the animal heat drawn to the place by the pad of cotton. The milk flows most freely after the occasional heavy rains in the intervals between the dry and wet seasons; it then spurts out with great force from any part of the tree if hacked with a knife in passing. The appearance of the campos changes very much according to the season. ‘There is not that grand uniformity of aspect throughout the year which is observed in the virgin forest, and which makes a deeper impression on the naturalist the longer he remains in this country. The seasons in this part of the Amazons region are sharply contrasted, but the difference is not so great as in some tropical countries where, during the dry monsoon, insects and reptiles estivate, and the trees simultaneously shed their leaves. As the dry season advances (August, September), the grass on the campos withers, and the shrubby vegetation near the town becomes a mass of parched yellow stubble. The period, however, is not one of general torpidity or repose for anirnal or vegetable life. Birds certainly are not so numerous as in the wet season, but some kinds remain and lay their eggs at this time—for instance, the ground doves (Chamepelia). The trees retain their verdure throughout, and many of them flower in the dry months. Lizards do not become torpid, and insects are seen both in the larva and the perfect states, showing that the aridity of the climate has not a general influence onthe development of the species. Some kinds of butterflies, especially the little hair-streaks (Thecle), whose larve feed on the trees, make their appearance only when the dry season is at its height. The land molluscs of the district are the only animals which estivate; they are found in clusters, Bulimi and Helices, concealed in hollow trees, the mouths of their shells closed by a film of mucus. The fine weather breaks up often with great suddenness about the beginning of February. Violent squalls from the west, or the opposite direction to the trade-wind, then occur. They give very little warning, and the first generally catches the people unprepared. They fall in the night, and blowing directly into the harbour, with the first gust sweep all vessels from their anchorage; in a few minutes a mass of canoes, large and small, including schooners of fifty tons burthen, are clashing together, pell-mell

on the beach. I have reason to remember these storms, for I was once caught in one myself, whilst crossing the river in an undecked boat, about a day’s journey from Santarem. They are accompanied with terrific electric explosions, the sharp claps of thunder falling almost simultaneously with the blinding flashes of lightning. Torrents of rain follow the first outbreak; the wind then gradually abates, and the rain subsides into a steady drizzle, which continues often for the greater part of the succeeding day. After a week or two of showery weather the aspect of the country is completely changed. The parched ground in the neighbourhood of Santarem breaks out, so to speak, ina rash of © greenery: the dusty, languishing trees gain, without having shed their old leaves, a new clothing of tender green foliage; a wonderful variety of quick-growing leguminous plants spring up, and leafy creepers overrun the ground, the bushes, and the trunks of trees. One is reminded of the sudden advent of spring after a few warm showers in northern climates; I was the more struck by it as nothing similar is witnessed in the virgin forests amongst which I had passed the four years previous to my stay in this part. The grass on the campos is renewed, and many of the campo trees, especially the myrtles, which grow abundantly in one portion of the district, begin to flower, attracting by the fragrance of their blossoms a great number and variety of insects, more particularly Coleoptera. Many kinds of birds, parrots, toucans, and barbets, which live habitually in the forest, then visit the open places. A few weeks of comparatively dry weather generally intervene in March after a month or two of rain. The heaviest rains fall in April, May, and June; they come in a succession of showers, with sunny gleamy weather in the intervals. June and July are the months when the leafy luxuriance of the campos, and the activity of life, are at their highest. Most birds have then completed their moulting, which extends over the period from February to May. The flowering shrubs are then mostly in bloom, and numberless kinds of Dipterous and Hymenopterous insects appear simultaneously with the flowers. ‘This season might be considered the equivalent of summer in temperate climates, as the bursting forth of the foliage in February represents the spring; but under the equator there is not that simultaneous march in the annual life of animals and plants which we see in high latitudes; some species, it is true, are dependent upon others in their periodical acts of life, and go hand-in-hand with them, but they are not all simultaneously and similarly affected by the physical changes of the seasons.

I will now give an account of some of my favourite collecting places in the neighbourhood of Santarem, incorporating with the description a few of the more interesting observations made on the Natural History of the localities. To the west of the town there was a pleasant path along the beach to a little bay, called Mapiri, about five miles within the mouth of the Tapajos. The road was practicable only in the dry season. The river at Santarem rises on the average about thirty feet, varying in different years about ten feet; so that in the four months from April to July the water comes up to the edge of the marginal belt of wood already spoken of. ‘This Mapir{f excursion was most pleasant

and profitable in the months from January to March, before the rains became too continuous. The sandy beach beyond the town is very irregular; in some places forming long spits, on which, when the east wind is blowing, the waves break in a line of foam; at others receding to shape out quiet little bays and pools. On the outskirts of the town a few scattered huts of Indians and coloured people are passed, prettily situated on the margin of the white beach, with a background of glorious foliage; the cabin of the pure-blood Indian being distinguished from the mud hovels of the free negroes and mulattoes by its light construction, half of it being an open shed, where the dusky tenants are seen at all hours of the day lounging in their open-meshed grass hammocks. About two miles on the road we come to a series of shallow pools, called the Laguinhos, which are connected with the river in the wet season, but separated from it by a high bank of sand topped with bushes at other times. There is a break here in the fringe of wood, and a glimpse is obtained of the grassy campo. When the waters have risen to the level of the pools, this place is frequented by many kinds of wading birds. Snow-white egrets of two species stand about the margins of the water, and dusky-striped herons may be seen half hidden under the shade of the bushes. The pools are covered with a small kind of water-lily, and surrounded by a dense thicket. Amongst the birds which inhabit this spot is the rosy-breasted Troupial (Trupialis Guianensis), a bird resembling our starling in size and habits, and not unlike it in colour, with the exception of the rich rosy vest. The water at this time of the year overflows a large level tract of campo bordering the pools, and the Troupials come to feed on the larve of insects which then abound in the moist soil. Beyond the Laguinhos there succeeds a tract of level beach, covered with trees, which form a beautiful grove. About the month of April, when the water rises to this level, the trees are covered with blossom, and a handsome orchid, an Epidendron with large white flowers, which clothes thickly the trunks, is profusely in bloom. Several kinds of kingfisher resort to the place: four species may be seen within a small space; the largest as big as a crow, of a mottled-grey hue, and with an enormous beak; the smallest not larger than a sparrow. The large one makes its nest in clay cliffs, three or four miles distant from this place. None of the kingfishers are so brilliant in colour as our English species. The blossoms on the trees attract two or three species of humming-birds, the most conspicuous of which is a large swallow-tailed kind (Eupetomena macroura), with a brilliant livery of emerald green and steel blue. I noticed that it did not remain so long poised in the air before the flowers as the other smaller species; it perched more frequently, and sometimes darted after small insects on the wing. Emerging from the grove there is a long stretch of sandy beach; the land is high and rocky, and the belt of wood which skirts the river banks is much broader than it is elsewhere. At length, after rounding a projecting bluff, the bay of Mapirf is reached. The river view is characteristic of the Tapajos: the shores are wooded, and on the opposite side is a line of clay cliffs, with hills in the background clothed with a rolling forest. A long spit of sand extends into mid-river, beyond which is an immense

expanse of dark water, the farther shore of the Tapajos being barely visible as a thin grey line of trees on the horizon. ‘The transparency of air and water in the dry season when the brisk east wind is blowing, and the sharpness of outline of hills, woods, and sandy beaches, give a great charm to this spot.

The little pools along the beach were tenanted by several species of fresh-water mollusks. The most abundant was a long turret-shaped Melania, which swarmed in them in the same way as Limnzez do in ponds at home. I found no Limnza, nor indeed any European genus of fresh-water mollusk, in the Amazons region. After the first storm of February the coast is strewn with large apple-shells (Ampullaria). They are not inhabitants of the pools on this side of the river, but are involuntary visitors, being driven across by the wind and waves with masses of marsh plants from the low land of the opposite shore. A great many are dead shells, and more or less worn. In showery weather I seldom came this way without seeing one or more water snakes of the genus Helicops. They were generally concealed under the heaps of thick aquatic grasses cast ashore by storms; and when exposed, always made off straight for the water. They glided along with such agility that I rarely succeeded in capturing one, and on reaching the river they sought at once the bottom in the deepest parts. I believe these snakes are swept from the marshy land of the western shore with the patches of grass and the Ampullariz just mentioned. Other reptiles and a great number of insects are blown or floated over in the same way by the violent squalls which occur in January or February. None of the species take root on the Santarem side of the river. Sometimes myriads of Coleopterous insects, belonging to about half a dozen kinds, are blown across, and become perfect pests to the townspeople for two or three nights, swarming about the lights inevery chamber. They get under one’s clothing, or down one’s back, and pass from the oil-lamp on to the furniture, books and papers, smearing everything they touch. The open shops facing the beach become filled with them, and customers have to make a dash in and out through the showers that fall about the large brass lamps over the counter, when they want to make a purchase. The species are certainly not indigenous to the eastern side of the river; the hosts soon disappear; those which cannot get back must perish helpless!,, for the soil, vegetation, and climate of the Santarem side are ill suited to the inhabitants of the opposite shore.

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