Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18.djvu/66

58 and then disappearing again. Sometimes we startled a herd of capivara, resting on the water's edge; and once we saw a sloth, sitting upon the branch of an Imbauba (Cecropia) tree, rolled up in its peculiar attitude, the very picture of indolence, with its head sunk between its arms. Much of the river-shore consisted of low alluvial land, and was covered with that peculiar and beautiful grass known as Capim; this grass makes an excellent pasturage for cattle, and the abundance of it in this region renders the district of Monte Alegre very favorable for agricultural purposes. Here and there, where the red clay soil rose above the level of the water, a palm-thatched cabin stood on the low bluff, with a few trees about it. Such a house was usually the centre of a cattle farm, and large herds 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 Maraja. After keeping along the Rio Gurupatuba for some distance, we turned to the right into a narrow stream, which has the character of an Igarapé in its lower course, though higher up it drains the country between the serra of Erreré and that of Tajury, and assumes the appearance of a small river. It is named after the serra, and is known as the Rio Erreré. 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 flexuosa). This forest stretched for miles, overshadowing, as a kind of underbrush, 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 dicotyledonous undergrowth; the inferior plants thus towering above and sheltering the superior ones. Among the lower trees were many Leguminosæ,—one of the most striking, called Fava, having a colossal pod. The whole mass of vegetation was woven together by innumerable lianas and creeping vines, in the midst of which the flowers of the Bignonia, with its open, trumpet-shaped corolla, were conspicuous. The capim was bright with the blossoms of the mallow growing in its midst, and was often edged with the broad-leaved Aninga, a large aquatic Arum.

Through such a forest, where the animal life was no less rich and varied than the vegetation, our boat glided slowly for hours. The number and variety of birds struck me with astonishment. The coarse sedgy grasses on either side were full of water birds, one of the most common of which was a small chestnut-brown wading bird, the Jaçana (Parra), whose toes are immensely long in proportion to its size, enabling it to run upon the surface of the aquatic vegetation, as if it were solid ground. It was in the month of January, their breeding season, and at every turn of the boat we started them up in pairs. Their flat, open nests generally contained five flesh-colored eggs, streaked in zigzag with dark brown lines. The other waders were a snow-white heron, another ash-colored, smaller species, and a large white stork. The ash-colored herons were always in pairs, the white one always single, standing quiet and alone on the edge of the water, or half hidden in the green capim. The trees and bushes were full of small warbler-like birds, which it would be difficult to characterize separately. To the ordinary observer they might seem like the small birds of our woods; but there was one species among them which attracted my attention by its numbers, and also because it builds the most extraordinary nest, considering the size of the bird itself, that I have ever seen. It is known among the country people by two names, as the Pedreiro or the Forneiro, both names referring, as will be seen, to the nature of its habitation. This singular nest is built of clay, and is as hard as stone (pedra), while it has the form of the round mandioca oven (forno) in which the country people prepare their farinha, or flour, made from