Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v1.djvu/229

 the great section of mammals to which the Pachydermata belong had its origin on that part of the earth's surface where South America now stands?

On the 16th of January the dry season came abruptly to an end. The sea breezes, which had been increasing in force for some days, suddenly ceased, and the atmosphere became misty; at length heavy clouds collected where a uniform blue sky had for many weeks prevailed, and down came a succession of heavy showers, the first of which lasted a whole day and night. This seemed to give a new stimulus to animal life. On the first night there was a tremendous uproar—tree-frogs, crickets, goat-suckers, and owls, all joining to perform a deafening concert. One kind of goat-sucker kept repeating at intervals throughout the night a phrase similar to the Portuguese words, "Joaō corta pao," "John, cut wood;" a phrase which forms the Brazilian name of the bird. An owl in one of the Genipapa trees muttered now and then a succession of syllables resembling the word "Murucututú." Sometimes the croaking and hooting of frogs and toads were so loud that we could not hear one another's voices within doors. Swarms of dragon-flies appeared in the daytime about the pools of water created by the rain, and ants and termites came forth in the winged state in vast numbers. I noticed that the winged termites, or white ants, which came by hundreds to the lamps at night, when alighting on the table, often jerked off their wings by a voluntary movement. On examination I found that the wings were