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National Geographic : 1920 Sep
Contents
VOL. XXXVIII, No. 3 WASHINGTON SEPTEMBER, 1920 NATIONAL GEORAI AHIC COPYRIGHT.1920.BY NATIONALGEOGRAPHICSOCIETY.WASHINGTON D. C. RIO DE JANEIRO, IN THE LAND OF LURE BY HARRIET CHALMERS ADAMS AUTHOR OF "PICTURESQUE PARAMARIBO," "KALEIDOSCOPIC LA PAZ," "THE FIRST TRANSANDINE RAILROAD IROM BUENOS AIRES TO VALPARAISO," "CUZCO, AMERICA'S ANCIENT MECCA," "IN FRENCH IORRAINE," ]TC. ON a forested hill overlooking Rio de Janeiro, not far from the eigh teenth century stone aqueduct which brings cool mountain water from Tijuca, lives an old man of Belgian blood who has earned a living since boyhood by catching butterflies. I found the old fel low in the dingy little.workshop where he sorts, stretches, and dries his treasures, mounting them in pasteboard boxes lined with pith, to which they can be securely pinned. He has become feeble, and now adays the boys in the neighborhood do most of the netting for him. Once he reached too far for a big golden beauty, fell off a cliff, and lay two days and nights in the jungle before he was found. "I am nearly eighty," he told me, "and have lived on this hill since I was a boy. Ever since I can remember I have caught moths and butterflies. Before the war most of my shipments were to Belgium; but now I sell to curio dealers in town and to tourists at the hotel on the hill. "We have many varieties of butterflies in this part of the country, and this morpho is the finest of them all." He pointed to a gorgeous eight-inch, metallic blue insect tipped with brown. "It flies here mostly in March." RIO IS AS VARIHUED AS A TROPIC BUTTERFLY As multicolored and varied in beauty as the butterflies of the tropics is the me tropolis of Brazil. When autumn leaves are falling in the "States," it is spring time in Rio de Janeiro. Then the tree tops on the hills are all abloom in pink and purple, scarlet and gold. In splendor of hue and setting, this great city of the South is unrivaled the world over. Here granite peak and tur quoise sea, tropic forest and rainbow tinted town, meet and harmonize. This city of lure terraces up from a glorious bay-the Bay of Guanabara, mountain-encircled, isle-bejeweled. From the shore, where parks and boulevards are fast crowding out the old Rio of nar row streets, rise the forested hills on whose slopes the lovelier portion of the city lies. Place your hands on the table, fingers spread, wrists upraised. Each finger rep resents one of Rio's hills; each space be tween, a canyon up which the city climbs. A CITY OF COLORFUL, GARDENS Spain is the land of paintings, Portu gal of gardens. In Brazil many things Portuguese have persisted besides the mother tongue. Colorful indeed are the gardens of Rio. There are old walled gardens sur rounding houses built in the days of the empire. These houses usually stand at the head of a canyon, or on the crest of a hill. They are dignified one-story buildings with large rooms, high ceilings, and many windows. Their vivid color is what the Brazilians call "Portuguese
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