Parrots, Toucans, and Tanagers i 
scrubby bush, amongst which are many guayava trees 
(Psidium sp.) having a fruit like a small apple filled with 
seeds, of a sub-acid flavour, from which the celebrated guava 
jelly is made. The fruit itself often occasions severe fits of 
indigestion, and many of the natives will not swallow the 
small seeds, but only the pulpy portion, which is said to be 
harmless. I saw another fruit growing here, a yellow berry 
about the size of a cherry, called ‘‘ Nancito”’ by the natives. 
It is often preserved by them with spirit and eaten like 
olives. Beyond the brushwood, which grows where the 
original forest has been cut down, there are large trees 
covered with numerous epiphytes—Tillandsias, orchids, ferns, 
and a hundred others, that make every big tree an aerial 
garden. Great arums perch on the forks and send down 
roots like cords to the ground, whilst lianas run from tree to 
tree or hang in loops and folds like the disordered tackle of a 
ship. 
Green parrots fly over in screaming flocks, or nestle in 
loving couples amidst the foliage, toucans hop along the 
branches, turning their long, highly-coloured beaks from 
side to side with an old-fashioned look, and beautiful tanagers 
(Ramphocelus passerinit) frequent the outskirts of the forest, 
all velvety black, excepting a large patch of fiery-red above 
the tail, which renders the bird very conspicuous. It is only 
the male that is thus coloured, the female being clothed in a 
sober suit of greenish-brown. I think this bird is polygamous, 
for several of the brown ones were always seen with one of 
the red-and-black ones. The bright colours of the male 
must make it very conspicuous to birds of prey, and, prob- 
ably in consequence, it is not nearly so bold as the obscurely- 
coloured females. When a clear space in the brushwood is 
to be crossed, such as a road, two or three of the females will 
fly across first, before the male will venture to do so, and he 
is always more careful to get himself concealed amongst the 
foliage than his mates. 
I walked some distance into the forest along swampy paths 
cut by charcoal burners, and saw many beautiful and curious 
insects. Amongst the numerous butterflies, large blue 
Morphos and narrow, weak-winged Heliconide, striped and 
spotted with yellow, red, and black, were the most conspicuous 
and most characteristic of tropical America. Amongst the 
