82 BLUEFIELDS. 



on the living things around me, while thus delight- 

 fully immersed by the half-hour together ; and, as 

 was indeed but fair, observations have been made on 

 me. On one occasion I had been lying motionless 

 for a long time, just beneath the surface, when a 

 Yulture (Cathartes aura) that had marked me from a 

 distance, began to descend in circles, swooping over 

 me, nearer and nearer at every turn, until at length 

 the shadow of his gaunt form swept close between my 

 face and the light, and the rushing of his wide-spread 

 wings fanned my body as he passed. It was evi- 

 dent that he had mistaken me for a drowned corpse ; 

 and probably it was the motion of my open eyes, as I 

 followed his course, that told him all was not quite 

 right, and kept him sailing round in low circles 

 instead of alighting. 



One day, about the middle of June, as I had just 

 jumped over the wall, and was walking down the 

 steep bank through the high Guinea-grass, with my 

 towel under my arm, my attention was arrested by 

 observing several little objects leaping up from the 

 pool against the cascade. Presently perceiving that 

 they were fishes, I returned to the house for my 

 insect water-net, and proceeded to the margin to 

 endeavour to capture one. I was not at once suc- 

 cessful ; my presence scared them : but soon one and 

 another began to leap from the boiling pot beneath 

 against the glassy wall above them. Most of them 

 achieved only a foot or two ; but I perceived one very 

 nearly lodge at the top, though the height of the fall, 

 from surface to surface, was not much short of six 

 feet, and the little performers were scarcely more 



