152 JUNGLE PEACE 



us slept scattered here and there in the great 

 room. 



The vampire bats never allowed us to become 

 bored. There were no mosquitoes or flies, so 

 we used no nets; but for months we burned a 

 lantern. Low around our heads swept the soft 

 wings of the little creatures, while the bat en- 

 thusiast now and then fired his auxiliary pistol. 

 Later we found that a score of them roosted 

 behind a broken clapboard, and, by spreading a 

 seine below and around this, we were able to 

 capture and examine the entire colony at will. 

 Tarantulas were common, but not in the least 

 offensive, and we learned to know where to look 

 for a big black fellow and a small gray one who 

 kept the room free from cockroaches. One or 

 two scorpions were caught indoors, but the 

 three centipedes which appeared occasionally 

 were those which had been brought in and were 

 always escaping from a defective vivarium. 

 There were no other dangers or inconveniences, 

 if we can apply such terms to these compara- 

 tively harmless creatures. 



This was the background of our labors, our 

 laboratory as our English visitors called it: 

 cool in the daytime, cold at night, where one 



