A JUNGLE LABOR-UNION 151 
became very vivid and near. Suddenly, without 
warning, there flapped into my field, a huge 
shapeless creature. It was no bird, and there 
was nothing of the bat in its flight—the wings 
moved with steady rhythmical beats, and drove 
it straight onward. The wings were skinny, the 
body large and of a pale ashy hue. For a mo- 
ment I was shaken. One of the others had seen 
it, and he, too, did not speak, but concentrated 
every sense into the end of the little tubes. By 
the time I had begun to find words, I realized 
that a giant fruit bat had flown from utter dark- 
ness across my line of sight; and by close watch- 
ing we soon saw others. But for a very few sec- 
onds these Pterodactyl Pups, as I nicknamed 
them, gave me all the thrill of a sudden glimpse 
into the life of past ages. The last time I had 
seen fruit bats was in the gardens of Perideniya, 
Ceylon. I had forgotten that they occurred in 
Guiana, and was wholly unprepared for the sight 
of bats a yard across, with a heron’s flight, pass- 
ing high over the Mazaruni in the moonlight. 
The talk ended on the misfortune of the con- 
figuration of human anatomy, which makes sky- 
searching so uncomfortable a habit. This out- 
look was probably developed to a greater extent 
