SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I93I 63 



Waterloo estate met us and took us to his home. A canal had just 

 been drained and we spent a half-day, assisted by 26 Javanese la- 

 borers, poking into the mud. The same 26 Javanese spent another half- 

 day groping in the mud at the bottom of a flooded rice field. Then we 

 took a seine and worked half a mile of a canal, drawing the seine 

 every 20 or 30 feet. Snakes were found, and many fish, but no Pipa. 

 Our time was drawing to an end. The assistant manager of the plan- 

 tation, born and raised in Surinam, remembered the toad from his 

 boyhood days in Paramaribo, but he had never seen it in the vicinity 

 of Nickeri ; so as it seemed fairly certain that we were in the wrong 

 place, we reluctantly abandoned our quest and returned to Georgetown. 

 A friend of ours in Paramaribo had promised to collect some 

 of these specimens for us, but during two months he was unable to 

 find any on account of the high water. Later on, when the pools dry 

 out more, he has promised to send us a milk-can full of toads, so 

 we feel that our search was not entirely in vain, especially as we 

 secured in Nickeri a number of rare birds and lizards. 1 



Each evening in the village of Nickeri there come from the sur- 

 rounding country thousands of red-spotted green parrots {Aratinga 

 sp.) which crowd the fronds of the palms on which they roost and 

 fill the air with their cries. 



At Georgetown on the day of sailing we heard that our steamer 

 was caught beyond the bar and could not get in until high tide the 

 following morning, so we dismissed the porters and proprietors of 

 donkey carts waiting to help us load our specimens, and told them 

 to be on hand at five o'clock next morning. But we had misjudged the 

 captain of the steamer, who waded his boat through the mud of the 

 bar and docked at ten o'clock that night. The boat was to sail at four 

 in the morning! With a hurriedly gathered crew of assistants we 

 loaded 99 crates of specimens, and 12 days later landed practically all 

 of them alive in New York for shipment to Washington. The first 

 officer had given us ample space between decks so the stock had 

 comfortable, uncrowded quarters. 



Many courtesies were extended to us during our stay in British 

 Guiana. Dr. George Giglioli. of Mackenzie, himself a keen naturalist, 



1 A. J. Jessurun, our friend at Paramaribo, kept his promise and three months 

 after our arrival at Washington we received two crates of the sought-for Suri- 

 nam toad Pipa americana. We met the steamer in New York and came to 

 Washington immediately with them. There were 88 live specimens, enough for 

 a splendid exhibition in the new reptile house, as well as some for distribution 

 to other collections. 



