THE LURE OF KARTABO 27 



gratitude to us. At least from April to Septem- 

 ber he sang every day, and if my interpretation 

 be anthropomorphic, why, so much the better for 

 anthropomorphism. At any rate, before we left, 

 all five wrens sat on a little shrub and imitated 

 the morning stars, and our hearts went out to 

 the little virile f eatherlings, who had lost none of 

 their enthusiasm for life in this tropical jungle. 

 Their one demand in this great wilderness was 

 man's presence, being never found in the jungle 

 except in an inhabited clearing, or, as I have 

 found them, clinging hopefully to the vanishing 

 ruins of a dead Indian's bendb, waiting and sing- 

 ing in perfect faith, until the jungle had crept 

 over it all and they were compelled to give up 

 and set out in search of another home, within 

 sound of human voices. 



Bare as our leaf-carpeted bamboo-glade ap- 

 peared, yet a select little company found life 

 worth living there. The dry sand beneath the 

 house was covered with the pits of ant-lions, and 

 as we watched them month after month, they 

 seemed to have more in common with the grains 

 of quartz which composed their cosmos than with 

 the organic world. By day or night no ant or 

 other edible thing seemed ever to approach or be 



