196 TROPICAL WILD LIFE IN BRITISH GUIANA 



laboratory, two miles away. The trunk then settled and was 

 at rest. 



The work of rain, and sun, and protoplasm, through 

 all the days and months, the years and centuries, was ended. 

 The myriad of seedlings all about, would now for a space 

 have renewed life, until some one of them gained a slight 

 advantage, and the rest bowed their heads in defeat, drawing 

 what moisture and light they could, and beginning their long 

 wait for another accident such as this. 



For a few minutes we danced about helplessly, not dar- 

 ing to rush in, for long after the tree had fallen a perfect 

 hail of branches, leaves, nuts and torn lianas hurtled down. 

 When it was comparatively safe we ran to the hole. Swiftly 

 we relieved one another with the ax and cut deep into the 

 hollow. The entrance was through an old, decayed knot- 

 hole, the butt of a branch long since dead and fallen. This 

 opening was three by six inches in diameter and the cavity 

 turned abruptly downward. When we had widened it, 1 

 could just get my hand inside, but by dint of much wrig- 

 gling I forced my arm down to the elbow, but could find no 

 bottom. Sounding with a pliable bush rope I found that 

 the base of the cavity was about a yard down the trunk. 

 We cut out a slice at this point and found a large quantity 

 of mold, mixed with various pits, and nuts and seeds. Some 

 of these were quite fresh, others had sprouted in the dark- 

 ness, showing ghostly white stems and rootlets. 



For a time we turned this over and over in vain. Not 

 so much as a feather rewarded us, and as failure again 

 loomed ominously before us, we became poignantly aware 

 of our bleeding hands and sodden clothing. Then from the 

 midst of the mold shone a gleam of white and no pocket 

 of nuggets ever drew from any discouraged group of min- 

 ers, a more joyful chorus of yells than burst from us. And 

 no pile of jackstraws was ever more carefully disentangled 

 than was that mass of mold, and wood and seeds. One by 

 one we removed the particles of debris, and when we finished 



