Page:A narrative of travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro.djvu/297

 1852.] VILLA NOVA. 265

from childhood. In the interior of the country there is not a road or path out of the towns, along which a person can walk with comfort or pleasure ; all is dense forest, or more impass- able clearings. Here are no flower-bespangled meadows, no turfy glades, or smooth shady walks to tempt the lover of nature ; here are no dry gravelled roads, where, even in the intervals of rain, we may find healthy and agreeable exercise ; here are no field-side paths among golden corn or luxuriant clover. Here are no long summer evenings, to wander in at leisure, and admire the slowly changing glories of the sunset ; nor long winter nights, with the blazing hearth, which, by drawing all the members of a family into close contact, pro- mote a social intercourse and domestic enjoyment, which the inhabitants of a tropical clime can but faintly realise.

At length the canoe arrived in which I was to go to Para, and I soon agreed for my passage, and set to work getting my things together. I had a great number of cases and boxes, six large ones which I had left with Senhor Henrique the year before, being still in his possession, because the great men of Barra were afraid they might contain contraband articles, and would not let them pass.

I now got them embarked, by making a declaration of their contents, and paying a small duty on them. Out of a hundred live animals which I had purchased or had had given to me, there now only remained thirty-four, consisting of five monkeys, two macaws, twenty parrots and paroquets of twelve different species, five small birds, a white-crested Brazilian pheasant, and a toucan.

On the 10th of June we left Barra, commencing our voyage very unfortunately for me ; for, on going on board, after bidding adieu to my friends, I missed my toucan, which had, no doubt, flown overboard, and not being noticed by any one, was drowned. This bird I esteemed very highly, as he was full- grown and very tame, and I had great hopes of bringing him alive to England.

On the 13th we reached Villa Nova, at which place, being the last in the new Province, we had to disembark to show our passports, as if entering into another kingdom ; and not content with this, there is another station half a day further down, on the exact boundary-line, where all vessels have to stay a second time, and again present their papers, as if the great object of