234 FIELD naturalists' club. 



I should say that about 150 yards is not over estimated. In the 

 bottom of the cave is a clear running stream in which we waded, 

 reaching as a rule to above the ankle and sometimes above the 

 knee. The bottom is composed of white quartz pebbles and 

 sand ; strewn about the bed are large boulders with jagged 

 ends which make progress very slow. At the sides of the river, 

 out of the current, there is a large accumulation of guano and 

 seeds of, so far as I could judge, several kinds of palms. The 

 roof of the cave slopes downwards and at the further end I could 

 not stand erect, while the water was above m}- knees. Divesting 

 ourselves of as much clothing as we could without running the 

 risk of getting chilled, we each lighted a pavil and entered the cave. 

 The scene which met our eyes and the noises we heard were of 

 peculiar weird ness. Above our heads about a hundred birds 

 fluttered, wheeled, darted, and screamed. The beatingof their wings 

 their shrill and piercing cries and croakings together with the 

 rushing and murmuring of the stream created an impression 

 which cannot be described but which was intensified by the 

 vaulted rocks and repeated by the echoes in the depths of the 

 cavern. Ped, by fixing a pavil at the end of a long rod bent 

 at the end like a shepherd's crook, to which was attached a fish 

 hook, showed me the nests of the birds some 25 feet above our 

 heads. They were mostly in the holes and fissures of the rock, 

 with which the sides of the cave are riddled. Feeling about the 

 nest with the hook we managed to get two young ones, but 

 they were very young and not j-et fit for table. Most of the 

 birds were still sitting on nests built of clay of a reddish colour. 

 As we penetrated into the" cave the noise increased, but when 

 we got into the lower parts, no more guacharos were seen and 

 we got into the region of the bats, which belonged to* one srecies 

 and were in numbers, treating us to a shrill concert which was 

 answered by the plaintive cries of the guacharos in the distance. 

 After securing a few specimens we retraced our steps and after 

 various tumbles over the boulders emerged into daylight and 

 seated ourselves at the entrance on the banks of the liver and 

 rested. We were glad to leave "a place where darkness does 

 not offer even the charm of silence and tranquillity." The 

 guacharo is known to science as the Steatornis caripensis Humb., 

 and is almost the only fruit-eating nocturnal bird known. It 

 feed.-, on hard fruit and at night fall I could see them flying over 

 the house and in the cocoa, uttering their lugubrious cries. 



19th April, 1895. 



* Chilonycteris rubiginoza. 



