r early rising.

At eleven o'clock we started for the Petropolis steamer, which took us
alongside a wooden pier, from the end of which the train started, and
we were soon wending our way through sugar and coffee plantations,
formed in the midst of the forest of palms and other tropical trees.
An Englishman has made a large clearing here, and has established a
fine farm, which he hopes to work successfully by means of immigrant
labour.

After a journey of twenty minutes in the train, we reached the
station, at the foot of a hill, where we found several four-mule
carriages awaiting our arrival. The drive up from the station to the
town, over a pass in the Organ mountains, was superb. At each turn of
the road we had an ever-varying view of the city of Rio and its
magnificent bay. And then the banks of this tropical high-road! From
out a mass of rich verdure grew lovely scarlet begonias, and spotted
caladiums, shaded by graceful tree-ferns and overhung by trees full of
exquisite parasites and orchids. Among these, the most conspicuous,
after the palms, are the tall thin-stemmed sloth-trees, so called from
their being a favourite resort of the sloth, who with great difficulty
crawls up into one of them, remains there until he has demolished
every leaf, and then passes on to the next tree.

The pace of the mules, up the steep incline, under a broiling sun, was
really wonderful. Half-way up we stopped to change, at a buvette,
where we procured some excellent Brazilia coffee, of fine but
exceedingly bitter flavour. Our next halt, midway between the buvette
and the top of the hill, was at a spring of clear sparkling water,
where we had an opportunity of collecting some ferns and flowers; and
on reaching the summit we stopped once more, to enjoy the fine view
over the Pass and the bay of Nictheroy. The descent towards Petropolis
then commenced; it lies in the hollow of the hills, with a river
flowing through the centre of its broad streets, on either side of
which are villas and avenues of noble trees. Altogether it reminded me
of Bagneres-de-Luchon, in the Pyrenees, though the general effect is
unfortunately marred by the gay and rather too fantastic painting of
some of the houses.

_Tuesday, August 22nd_.--We were called at half-past five, and, after
a hasty breakfast, started on horseback by seven o'clock for the
Virgin Forest, about six miles from Petropolis. After leaving the town
and its suburbs, we pursued our way by