time are always in larger companies. In appearance
they have something of the character of both the pheasant and peacock,
and yet do not closely resemble either. With the exception of some
small partridge-like gallinaceous birds, the representatives of this
family in Brazil belong to types which do not exist in any other parts
of the world. Here the curassow, the jacu, the jacami, and the unicorn
resemble as much the bustard and other ostrich-like birds as the hen and
pheasant.

The most numerous insects to be met with are dragonflies; some with
crimson bodies, black heads, and burnished wings; others with large,
green bodies, crossed by blue bands.

THE CAMPOS.

Although the forests cover generally the whole length and breadth of the
Amazonian Valley, there are here and there, on the higher ground, open
dry plains with scanty vegetation,--the ground in the water-courses or
gullies, formed of clay, being baked by the heat of the sun into
slate-like masses. One of these spots we now reach. The most prominent
plants of this sandy or clayey region are clusters of cacti and curua
palms--a kind of stemless, low palm, with broad leaves springing,
vase-like, from the ground. Here also grow wild pineapples; and in
broad sunlight numerous humming-birds delight to sport and feed upon the
blossoms of the various plants which find no room to bloom in the darker
shades of the forest.

GEOLOGY OF THE AMAZONIAN VALLEY.

Professor Agassiz remarks that no formation--known to geologists--
resembling that of the Amazon exists on the face of the earth. Its
extent is stupendous. It stretches from the Atlantic shore through the
whole width of Brazil into Peru, to the very foot of the Andes--one vast
extent of red sandstone, capped by a yellow-ochred clay; not only along
the banks of the main river, but forming the sides of those of its
tributaries, to their far-off sources, probably over the whole basin of
the Paraguay and the Rio de la Plata. How are these vast deposits
formed? is the question. The easiest answer, he observes, and the one
which most readily suggests itself, is that of a submersion of the
continent at successive periods--to allow the accumulation of these
materials--and its subsequent elevation. This explanation is rejected,
for the simple reason that the deposits show no signs whatever of a
marine origin. No sea-shells, or remains of any marine animal, have as
yet been found throughout their whole extent--