NATURAL HISTORY COLLECTING. 277 



grand Cassidce, and Erotyli, Rutelce, or Melolonthids, Gym- 

 netis, &c. ; often a Ctenostoma running along some slender 

 twig. It requires a certain kind of weather for Coleo- 

 ptera, and some days all seem to be absent at once. 



" Whilst I am about these things, I often hear the noise 

 of birds above pretty tanagers, or what not. You can- 

 not see the colours of red, cobalt-blue, or beryl-green, 

 when they are up in the trees ; and it takes months of 

 experience to know your bird. I have sometimes shot at 

 small, obscure-looking birds up the trees, and when they 

 have fallen, have been dazzled by their exquisite beauty. 



" I walk about a mile straight ahead, lingering in rich 

 spots, and diverging often. It is generally near two P.M. 

 when I reach home, thoroughly tired. I get dinner, lie 

 in hammock a while reading, then commence preparing 

 my captives, &c. ; this generally takes me till five P.M. In 

 the evening I take tea, write and read, but generally in 

 bed by nine/' * 



I might quote similar details from Mr Wallace's letters, 

 written while engaged in similar pursuits in a neighbour- 

 ing part of the same mighty continent. But I prefer 

 citing, in illustration of our subject, his observations made 

 when, after having satiated himself in the west, he turned 

 to the gorgeous east, and set himself to explore the virgin 

 treasures of the remotest parts of the Indian Archipelago. 

 Who cannot sympathise with his enthusiasm, when he 

 gays : I I 00 k forward with unmixed satisfaction to my 

 visit to the rich and almost unexplored Spice Islands 



* Zoologist, p. 5659, 



