A Jaguar-Hunt on the Taquary 75 



English is indispensable to any learned man who expects 

 to make his learning count for what it ought to <;ount 

 in the effect on his fellow men. The outdoor naturalist, 

 the faunal naturalist, who devotes himself primarily to 

 a study of the habits and of the life-histories of birds, 

 beasts, fish, and reptiles, and who can portray truthfully 

 and vividly what he has seen, could do work of more 

 usefulness than any mere collector, in this upper Para- 

 guay country. The work of the collector is indispensa- 

 ble ; but it is only a small part of the work that ought to 

 be done ; and after collecting has reached a certain point 

 the work of the field observer with the gift for recording 

 what he has seen becomes of far more importance. 



The long days spent riding through the swamp, the 

 "pantanal," were pleasant and interesting. Several times 

 we saw the tamandua bandeira, the giant ant-bear. Ker- 

 mit shot one, because the naturalists eagerly wished for 

 a second specimen; afterward we were relieved of all 

 necessity to molest the strange, out-of-date creatures. It 

 was a surprise to us to find them habitually frequenting 

 the open marsh. They were always on muddy ground, 

 and in the papyrus-swamp we found them in several 

 inches of water. The stomach is thick-walled, like a 

 gizzard; the stomachs of those we shot contained adult 

 and larval ants, chiefly termites, together with plenty of 

 black mould and fragments of leaves, both green and 

 dry. Doubtless the earth and the vegetable matter had 

 merely been taken incidentally, adhering to the viscid 

 tongue when it was thrust into the ant masses. Out in 

 the open marsh the tamandua could neither avoid obser- 

 vation, nor fight effectively, nor make good its escape 



