VII 

 A JUNGLE LABOR-UNION 



PTERODACTYL PUPS led me to the wonderful 

 Attas the most astounding of the jungle labor- 

 unions. We were all sitting on the Mazaruni 

 bank, the night before the full moon, immediately 

 in front of my British Guiana laboratory. All 

 the jungle was silent in the white light, with now 

 and then the splash of a big river fish. On the 

 end of the bench was the monosyllabic Scot, who 

 ceased the exquisite painting of mora buttresses 

 and jungle shadows only for the equal fascina- 

 tion of searching bats for parasites. Then the 

 great physician, who had come six thousand 

 miles to peer into the eyes of birds and lizards in 

 my dark-room, working with a gentle hypnotic 

 manner that made the little beings seem to enjoy 

 the experience. On my right sat an army cap- 

 tain, who had given more thought to the possible 

 secrets of French chaffinches than to the ap- 

 proaching barrage. There was also the artist, 

 who could draw a lizard's head like a Japanese 



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