Along the Essequebo and Potaro. 155 



fired, and the boat sent up and down the river to search 

 for him but without result; and in the morning another 

 Indian was sent out, blowing the great horn. Almost 

 immediately after, the missing huntsman, who had 

 followed a deer too far and had been overtaken by the 

 stormy night, turned up from the opposite direction and 

 proceeded to consume his early meal as though nothing 

 had happened; while in the distance the great horn was 

 sounding out for his return, and kept on sounding for 

 some considerable time ere the blower could be re-called. 



On the return journey, a camp was made quite early 

 at Canaruck — a place noted as a special hunting- 

 ground for the lau-lau and other large Siluroids —where 

 also two fine peccaries (Dicotyles torquatus) , two 

 maams (Tinamus sub-cristatus), and a large powis or 

 bush-turkey (Crax aledlor) were procured and skinned. 

 The peccaries were horribly infested with the smali and 

 hard bush ticks, and it was altogether out of the question 

 to keep them off one's body, since the crab-oil which is a 

 very good preventative against all these parasites, had 

 been lost a day or two before by an accident to the 

 bottle. 



The long line fishing yielded no lau-lau, buta very line 

 tiger-lish (Platystoma tigrinum) was caught, brilliantly 

 marked with its black and white cross stripes on the 

 blue and scaleless ground, and with red fins; and also a 

 large golden-eyed baiara Hydrolycus scomberouies) 

 more than two feet in length, with bright silvery 

 scales and two enormously long and sharp strong teeth 

 in the front of the under jaw, fitting, when the mouth is 

 closed, into sockets in the upper jaw, like the so-called 

 canine teeth of the alligator. Both of the specimens 



U 2 



