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Show 554 MISS E. M . S H A R P E O N [June 17> canoe was gaining on me, I had to cut my way out to the river and collect on the stretches of sand where I came across them, which I frequently did, as the river was low. " O n the sand I could make better time; but I could seldom afford the luxury of following up any particular specimen if I happened to miss it with the first stroke of m y net, as I had to keep up with the canoe. All this was of course a serious handicap to collecting. Any damp spot on the sand was sure, at a certain time of the day, to be crowded with Butterflies, and sometimes they were in such vast quantities that if one got up to where they were drinking, it was difficult to capture any particular insect without getting thirty others into the net at the same time, and in their struggles to get free they broke each other's wings, and you often found your particular specimen utterly ruined. In these great gatherings of thirsty Butterflies drinking, I always noticed twenty or more of a yellow or white colour to one of any other. On the Araguaya, between a small military settlement called Martyrios and a larger one 200 miles further up called Santa Maria, lies the country of the Caraja Indians, and collecting becomes very risky. In fact, as we had to pass about ten of their large ' aldeas,' or settlements on the river, we had to keep together as much as possible. When after Butterflies I never troubled to carry a rifle or gun, finding myself hampered enough with a cutlass; but even if I had done so, I should have had a very poor chance against Indians in the forest. "The Indians have certainly chosen the most lovely part of the river-a paradise for a naturalist; and, in spite of the difficulties, I managed to get some good specimens, but of Butterflies only, as I found it impossible to collect birds or other animals, seeing that we should have to leave our boat farther up and make our way 150 miles by land. Near Santa Maria, on the other side of the river, some twenty miles inland, is a large settlement of Cayapo Indians. I wanted very much indeed to go over; but the Commandant of the place would not give me permission, or even let me hire a couple of men to paddle me to the opposite shore, as one or two people who went across some time back had been killed; in fact, the inhabitants at Santa Maria keep entirely to their own side of the river. " From Santa Maria to some way past the island of Bananal (a very large island, nearly 300 miles long, and said to contain its own rivers and mountains) there are no white settlers, the country being in the hands of another branch of the Carajas, on the west side of the island. This tribe is supposed to be more 'manso,' or tame, than the Carajas between Martyrio and Santa Maria, where they are said to be very ' bravos,' or fierce. From what I could judge (and I saw a good deal of both tribes), I would rather trust myself to the latter. I got some good specimens round about the city of Goyaz and on our trip down the Vermelho River ; the latter full of fever and every conceivable fly that bites. " I had great difficulty in getting my specimens across the Araguaya to the Upper Tocantins ; but once in the latter river, we got a small canoe at a settlement, and after ascending the river for some |