SU RUB RES AND OROTINA 397 



white flowers; dainty little begonias with long narrow leaves 

 and pink flowers. The last two we saw only on the Pacific 

 side, the first we found in profusion in the Reventazon valley 

 at Juan Vihas. The bull's horn thorn was common along this 

 road and we watched the ants sipping the nectar from the 

 glands on the petioles. On the leaves of roadside plants 

 were a number of flies {Scepsis sp.) some of which, reddish- 

 brown in color, had the abdomen contracted to a narrower 

 stalk where it joined the thorax and the wings folded down 

 over the back. These features gave the fly a very ant-like 

 appearance and it ran over the leaf in quite ant-like fashion. 



Leaf-cutting ants were very active at Surubres, and along 

 the road from Orotina. We noted one column of ants nine 

 inches wide, formed by the junction of several smaller col- 

 umns. The pieces of leaves which they were carrying had 

 become so wet, owing to the rain, that the ants were dropping 

 them in a great heap. 



Behind the house, and in a general northerly direction, 

 the land rose considerably so that the highest part of the 

 farm was looo feet according to our aneroid, while the farm- 

 house stood at 800 feet and the river a little below the ford 

 was only 550 feet. This upper part of the farm was either 

 forest or old pasture growing up into charral, through which 

 we climbed on October 20 with little Jose and his big machete 

 to cut a way for us. From the highest parts of the charral 

 we obtained fine views toward the southwest, where the 

 Gulf of Nicoya and the Pacific could be clearly seen : Puntare- 

 nas was hidden by nearby hills but our view extended from a 

 little south of that port to the Herradura Mountains, and in- 

 cluded the lower part of the Gulf with a number of its islands, 

 the peninsula of Nicoya and the Rock of Caldera. One of 

 the best of these views we had from a hillock marked by a 

 single tall tree which Jose said was a corteza. Above the 

 corteza was a "rancho," a hut with a steeply-sloping gable 



