292 WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA 



more on his departure from it. It is called the 

 alien bill; and every Barbadian who leaves or 

 returns to the island, and every Englishman too, 

 pays the tax ! 



Finding no vessel here for Trinidad, I em- 

 barked in a schooner for Demerara, landed there 

 after being nearly stranded on a sand-bank, and 

 proceeded without loss of time to the forests in 

 the interior. It was the dry season, which ren- 

 ders a residence in the woods very delightful. 



There are three species of Jacamar to be found 

 on the different sand-hills and dry savannas of 

 Demerara ; but there is another much larger and 

 far more beautiful to be seen when you arrive 

 in that part of the country where there are rocks. 

 The jacamar has no affinity to the wood- 

 pecker or kingfisher nothwithstanding what trav- 

 ellers affirm), either in its haunts or anatomy. 

 The jacamar lives entirely on insects, but never 

 goes in search of them. It sits patiently for hours 

 together on the branch of a tree, and when the 

 incautious insect approaches, it flies at it with the 

 rapidity of an arrow, seizes it, and generally re- 

 turns to eat it on the branch which it had just 

 quitted. It has not the least attempt at song, is 

 very solitary, and so tame that you may get within 

 three or four yards of it before it takes flight. 

 The males of all the different species which I have 

 examined have white feathers on the throat. I 

 suspect that all the male jacamars hitherto dis- 

 covered have this distinctive mark. I could learn 

 nothing of its incubation. The Indians informed 

 me that one species of jacamar lays its eggs in 

 the Wood- Ants' nests, which are so frequent in 



