2/0 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. 



At noon we stopped for breakfast in a primeval forest with 

 rather thin underbrush. Many small scarab beetles (Can- 

 thon semiopacus) were resting in the hollows of leaves with 

 their branched antennae raised, waiting apparently for some 

 hint of an odor which should summon them to their mission 



FIG. 116. SHOOTING THE RAPIDS AT FULL SPEED. 



of life the depositing of their eggs in decaying flesh. Spin- 

 ning through the aisles made by the giant columns of tree- 

 trunks, were curious translucent pin-wheels, and not until 

 we captured one in the butterfly net did we realize we were 

 looking at the same attenuated forest dragon-flies (Mecisto- 

 gaster sp.) which had deceived us so completely five years 

 ago in Mexico.* The movement of the long, narrow wings, 

 with the spot of white at the tips was, to the eye, a cir- 

 cular revolving whirl, with the needle -sized body trailing 



* Two Bird-lovers in Mexico, pp. 239-241. 



