Birds were not uncommon, but rather hard to observe on account of the density of the vegetation. Near the river stretched a wide band of bamboo, beautiful to look upon but impossible to penetrate without the aid of a machete. Just beyond, the trees grew tall and in close proximity, giant _castanhas_, _heveas_, and ironwoods intermingling their branches to form a canopy of deepest green, impervious to sunlight and through which rain filtered slowly; palms, ferns, and thorny shrubbery formed a dense undergrowth near the streams, so that progress at best was slow. From all sides came the clear, ringing “_hoo-whee-whee-hoo_” of the gold-bird, or whistling _cotinga_, often misnamed the bell-bird, and although the sound came from but a few feet overhead, it was usually impossible to locate the dull, slate-colored songster perched motionless on a well-screened branch. The smaller species of birds travelled in large flocks, doubtless deriving some mutual benefit from this mode of living; usually the band was preceded by a few scouting brown wood-hewers, some with slender bills four inches long bent in a half-circle, flitting silently from trunk to trunk, lighting low down and running up rapidly, while they searched the crevices in the bark for insects; then came the vast host of vireos, warblers, flycatchers, tanagers, and woodpeckers, completely investing the trees in their all-absorbing quest of a livelihood. Twigs snapped, seeds dropped, the woods seemed full of fluttering wings and chirping voices; but in a few moments the noise grew faint and stopped; the tireless army had gone its way, and the vanguard of trogons suddenly appeared, hovered in mid-air to snap off an enticing fruit, and then hurried away. Occasionally we were fortunate enough to shoot a curassow, a large turkey-like bird, and then our Brazilian chef prepared the national dish called _canja_; it consists of a fowl and rice boiled together and is delicious. On account of its large size, work on the dugout progressed slowly; a section of the trunk, some thirty feet long, had been cut off where the tree had fallen, and this was being hollowed out with adzes, while short-handled axes were used in dressing down the exterior. After twelve days of continuous hewing the dugout began to assume the appearance of a seaworthy craft, and we figured that she would be ready to launch at the end of another two weeks; but the next day a _batelão_ arrived. Her captain had been fighting his way up the Gy-Paraná over three months in his efforts to reach Barão de Melgaço, having been sent from the Madeira by order of Colonel Rondon.