184 JUNGLE PEACE 



placed. A stuffed bird in a case may resist dis- 

 integration for a century. But when we go to 

 look for the bluebirds which nest in the orchard, 

 they may have flown a half mile away in their 

 search for food. The plover which scurries be- 

 fore us today on the beach may tonight be far 

 away on the first lap of his seven thousand mile 

 flight to the southward. 



The hoatzin's status lies rather with the caged 

 bird. In November in New York City an Eng- 

 lishman from British Guiana said to me, " Go to 

 the Berbice River, and at the north end of the 

 town of New Amsterdam, in front of Mr. 

 Beckett's house, you will find hoatzins." Six 

 months later as I drove along a tropical river 

 road I saw three hoatzins perched on a low 

 thorn bush at the river's edge in front of a 

 house. And the river was the Berbice, and the 

 house that of Mr. Beckett. 



Thus are the hoatzins independent of space, 

 as all other flying birds know it, and in their 

 classic reptilian affinities, voice, actions, arms, 

 fingers, habits, they bring close the dim epochs 

 of past time, and renew for our inspection the 

 youth of bird-life on the earth. It is discour- 

 aging ever to attempt to translate habits fraught 



