144 A NATURALIST IN THE GUIANAS 



tions, persist in asserting that this wail is made by one 

 of the sloths. In the island of Trinidad the cry of the 

 wood-nightjar can be heard on almost any night in the 

 stretch of mangrove swamp along the coast between the 

 towns of Port of Spain and San Fernando. The wood- 

 cutters who pass a part of their lives in this waste of 

 wood and mud, say that as the sloth toils lazily from 

 branch to branch he utters at intervals the complaint 

 'Poor — me— one— 0.' What has probably led to this 

 error is the existence in the swamps of the little ant- 

 eater in fairly large numbers. The woodcutters have in 

 consequence associated this ant-eater, which they call a 

 sloth, with the strange cry they hear at nights. 



The wood-nightjar is a difficult bird to detect during the 

 day. He chooses for perching some mottled stump or branch 

 so closely resembling his plumage that he appears to form 

 part of the bough upon which he is sitting. I suppose in 

 my wanderings I must have passed quite close to a good 

 many of these large nightjars, yet I must confess that 

 only on one occasion did I get a good opportunity of 

 observing the habits of this bird. We had had a morning's 

 duck-shooting and were resting in the shade of one of the 

 mangrove-trees which line the creeks, when what had 

 appeared to me to be a dry stump jutting out of one of 

 the branches seemed to move slightly. I threw lumps of 

 clay and bits of stick at it, but it did not move until it 

 was actually struck, when, to our surprise, a wood night- 

 jar flitted a short distance away, alighting on a stump 

 similar to the one which he had quitted a moment before. 

 He immediately flattened his tail against his perch and 

 assumed an attitude which gave him all the appearance 

 of being part of the stump on which he rested. I dis- 

 turbed him repeatedly and he invariably followed the 



