The whole valley for 1600 miles is filled with dense and tangled forests. Noble trees of unrivalled beauty blossom in endless prodigality. Birds of gorgeous plumage nestle in their lofty recesses. Tall ferns, vines, creeping plants and parasites form a dense tangle of undergrowth, swarming with life. Myriads of insects in great variety, reptiles of strange and singular form, lizards and venemous serpents find their homes and sustenance in the wild, dense mass of vegetation. _The Amazon_. The valley of the Amazon collects its waters from a region 1800 miles wide from north to south and 2500 miles long from the Andes to the Atlantic ocean. Even at the foot of the Andes the Amazon is a mighty river. The valley rapidly narrows to a width of 600 or 700 miles, and then more gradually to the ocean, {4} where it is only 150 miles wide. Its total fall from the foot-hills of the Andes to the Atlantic is very slight, not over three or four hundred feet, and probably considerably less. The rims of the valley are formed of diorite and sandstone, and are raised only a little above the flood-plain, which is formed of mud and silt, the detritus brought down by the Amazon and its tributaries. The flood-plain is from fifty to one hundred miles wide, gradually narrowing as it approaches the ocean. Through this valley the Amazon cuts its way, separating often into channels which sometimes run parallel to each other for several hundred miles, frequently forming large islands, or expanding into lakes. Similar flood-plains are found on all its larger tributaries. Up from the ocean into this valley an immense tidal wave rolls, with a bore, twice a day, forcing back the current of the Amazon 500 miles and inundating a portion of the flood-plain. In the early autumn the equatorial rise commences in the headwaters of its tributaries, far south of the equator. The rains and melting snow raise the streams, and these the waters of the Amazon. As the sun crosses the equator and moves to the north the rain follows its course, and the branches that have their source in the east and northeast add their flood to the waters of the southerly branches. The flood in the Amazon is thus continued for nearly six months, raising its waters from 30 to 50 feet. The channels are filled, and the flood-plains are overflowed. The whole valley becomes a net-work of navigable waters, with islands and channels and lakes innumerable, forming a great inland sea, which the Brazilians call the Mediterranean of America. The upland, though only a little above the flood-plain, is rarely overflowed. The plants and animals of the flood-plain were formerly considered as distinct from those of the upland as are the plants and animals of Europe from those of America; but later investigations show that there is but little difference between the species.