4 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 
coon, and for the second time the land was given 
over to cutlass and fire. But again there was 
a halting in the affairs of man, and the rubber 
saplings were not planted or were smothered; 
and again the jungle smiled patiently through 
a knee-tangle of thorns and blossoms, and the 
charred clumps of razor-grass sent forth skeins 
of saws and hanks of living barbs. 
I stood beneath the familiar cashew trees, 
which had yielded for me so bountifully of their 
crops of blossoms and hummingbirds, of fruit and 
of tanagers, and looked out toward the distant 
jungle, which trembled through the expanse of 
palpitating heat-waves; and I knew how a her- 
mit crab feels when its home pinches, or is out 
of gear with the world. And, too, Nupee was 
dead, and the jungle to the south seemed to call 
less strongly. So I wandered through the old 
house for the last time, sniffing the agreeable 
odor of aged hypo still permeating the dark 
room, re-covering the empty stains of skins and 
traces of maps on the walls, and re-filling in my 
mind the vacant shelves. The vampires had re- 
turned to their chosen roost, the martins still 
swept through the corridors, and as I went down 
the hill, a moriche oriole sent a silver shaft of 
