Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v1.djvu/339

 wise than as modifications of one and the same species; one produced on the North, the other on the South side of the Amazons. It is worthy of especial mention that here as well as in the cases of P. Lysander and the Heliconii, described in the preceding chapter, the connecting links are found inhabiting distinct localities, and not mingled with the extreme forms which they connect.

We left Serpa on the 29th of December, in company of an old planter named Senhor Joaō Trinidade; at whose sitio, situated opposite the mouth of the Madeira, Penna intended to spend a few days. Our course on the 29th and 30th lay through narrow channels between islands. On the 31st we passed the last of these, and then beheld to the south a sea-like expanse of water, where the Madeira, the greatest tributary of the Amazons, after 2000 miles of course, blends its waters with those of the king of rivers. I was hardly prepared for a junction of waters on so vast a scale as this, now nearly 900 miles from the sea. Whilst travelling week after week along the somewhat monotonous stream, often hemmed in between islands, and becoming thoroughly familiar with it, my sense of the magnitude of this vast water system had become gradually deadened; but this noble sight renewed the first feelings of wonder. One is inclined, in such places as these, to think the Paraenses do not exaggerate much when they call the Amazons the Mediterranean of South America. Beyond the mouth of the Madeira, the Amazons sweeps down in a majestic reach, to all appearance not a whit less in breadth before than