Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v2.djvu/152

 their oars on leaving the port of the Tushaúa. I was surprised to find a dense fog veiling all surrounding objects, and the air quite cold. The lofty wall of forest, with the beautiful crowns of Assai palms standing out from it on their slender, arching stems, looked dim and strange through the misty curtain. The sudden change a little after sunrise had quite a magical effect, for the mist rose up like the gauze veil before the transformation scene at a pantomime, and showed the glorious foliage in the bright glow of morning, glittering with dew-drops. We arrived at the falls about ten o'clock. The river here is not more than forty yards broad, and falls over a low ledge of rock stretching in a nearly straight line across.

We had now arrived at the end of the navigation for large vessels—a distance from the mouth of the river, according to a rough calculation, of a little over seventy miles. I found it the better course now to send José and one of the men forward in the montaria with Joaõ Aracú, and remain myself with the cuberta and our other man, to collect in the neighbouring forest. We stayed here four days; one of the boats returning each evening from the upper river with the produce of the day's chase of my huntsmen. I obtained six good specimens of the hyacinthine macaw, besides a number of smaller birds, a species new to me of Guaríba, or howling monkey, and two large lizards. The Guaríba was an old male, with the hair much worn from his rump and breast, and his body disfigured with large tumours made by the grubs of a gad-fly (Œstrus). The back and tail were of a ruddy-brown colour; the limbs and under-