144 JUNGLE PEACE 



of the horizon over the expanse of three mighty 

 rivers the Essequibo, the Mazaruni, and the 

 Cuyuni. And around us was high second 

 growth, losing itself to the southward in a gi- 

 gantic, abrupt wall of the real jungle the 

 jungle that I knew by experience was more 

 wonderful than any of the forests of the Far 

 East, of Burma or Ceylon or Malaysia. 



We sat down on some packing-boxes after 

 our first day of indoor labor, and watched the 

 sun settle slowly beyond the silvered Mazaruni. 

 And a song, not of the tropics, but bubbling and 

 clear and jubilant as that of our northern sing- 

 ers, rang out from the single tall palm standing 

 in our front compound. Clinging to the top- 

 most frond was an oriole, jet as night, with 

 the gold of sunshine on crown and shoulders 

 and back. He was singing. While he sang, a 

 second oriole swooped upward between two 

 vanes of a frond to a small ball of fibers knotted 

 close to the midrib. The event had come and it 

 developed swiftly. 



We seized a great ladder and by superhuman 

 efforts raised it little by little, until it rested 

 high against the smooth trunk. One of us then 

 mounted the swaying rungs, reckless with ex- 



