120 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. 



It is very hard for us Northerners to realize that the course 

 of a tropical day is much the same the year around. Here is 

 a Georgetown day as we found it in February. At 5.30 A.M. 

 it is still dark and the only sound is an occasional raucous 

 crow from chanticleer. Soon a subdued murmur of sound is 

 heard and this remains unchanged in volume for some time. 

 Then the sunrise gun booms in the distance; a Kiskadee 

 shrieks just outside our window; a score of others answer 

 him; church chimes ring out; noisy coolie carts rattle past; 

 negroes sing, dogs bark; an excellent brass band strikes up a 

 two-step and amid all this pandemonium of sound the sun 

 literally leaps above the horizon and instantly fills the world 

 with brilliant color. The scene changes like magic; there 

 is no dawn or dusk, night gives place to day without 

 intermission. The temperature morning and evening is 

 about 76. 



Woven amid all the harsh cries of Kiskadees and Tana- 

 gers is heard the sweet warbling of the little House Wrens, 

 reminding us of our singers of the North, and bubbling over 

 with the same crisp, vocal vitality which we hear in early 

 Spring in our own country. 



Like the morning, the tropical day itself is one of extremes. 

 The morning dawns fresh and bracing; until nine o'clock one 

 walks briskly, breathes deeply and can hardly realize that he 

 is at sea-level within seven degrees of the equator. It is April 

 and May in the calendar of one's feelings. Then for an hour 

 or two June reigns, and finally from eleven to five o'clock in 

 the afternoon it is hot, sultry August. In the shade, however, 

 it is always comfortable. From three o'clock on we experi- 

 ence the coolness of October and until darkness shuts sud- 

 denly down about half-past six like the snuffing out of 

 a candle the temperature is perfect. The nights are de- 

 lightfully cool. Mosquitoes are bad only in the houses and 

 at night one's net is a protection. The humidity is high but 



