214 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 



shrill that it verges upon the very limits of our 

 hearing. And these, combined, unified, are no 

 more than the ground surge beneath the countless 

 waves of sound. For the voice of the jungle is 

 the voice of love, of hatred, of hope, of despair 

 and in the night-time, when the dominance of 

 sense-activity shifts from eye to ear, from retina 

 to nostril, it cries aloud its confidences to all the 

 world. But the human mind is not equal to a 

 true understanding of these; for in a tropical 

 jungle the birds and the frogs, the beasts and the 

 insects are sending out their messages so swiftly 

 one upon the other, that the senses fail of their 

 mission and only chaos and a great confusion are 

 carried to the brain. The whirring of invisible 

 wings and the movement of the wind in the low 

 branches become one and the same : it is an epic, 

 told in some strange tongue, an epic filled to 

 overflowing with tragedy, with poetry and mys- 

 tery. The cloth of this drama is woven from 

 many-colored threads, for Nature is lavish with 

 her pigment, reckless with life and death. She 

 is generous because there is no need for her to be 

 miserly. And in the darkness, I have heard the 

 working of her will, translating as best I could. 

 In the darkness, I have at times heard the 



