Up the River of Tapirs 153 



hunters and I have heard of men being badly wounded by 

 them, while almost every man who hunts them often is 

 occasionally forced to scramble up a tree to avoid a 

 charge. But I have never heard of a man being killed by 

 them. They sometimes surround the tree in which the 

 man has taken refuge and keep him up it. Cherrie, on 

 one occasion in Costa Rica, was thus kept up a tree for 

 several hours by a great herd of three or four hundred 

 of these peccaries ; and this although he killed several of 

 them. Ordinarily, however, after making their charge 

 they do not turn, but pass on out of sight. Their great 

 foe is the jaguar, but unless he exercises much caution 

 they will turn the tables on him. Cherrie, also in Costa 

 Rica, came on the body of a jaguar which had evi- 

 dently been killed by a herd of peccaries some twenty- 

 four hours previously. The grotmd was trampled up 

 by their hoofs, and the carcass was rent and slit into 

 pieces. 



Benedetto, as soon as we discovered the tracks, slipped 

 off his horse, changed his leggings for sandals, threw his 

 rifle over his arm, and took the trail of the herd, followed 

 by the only dog which would accompany him. The pec- 

 caries had gone into a broad belt of forest, with a marsh 

 on the farther side. At first Antonio led the colonel and 

 me, all of us on horseback, at a canter round this belt to 

 the marsh side, thinking the peccaries had gone almost 

 through it. But we could hear nothing. The dog only 

 occasionally barked, and then not loudly. Finally we 

 heard a Shot. Benedetto had found the -herd, which 

 showed no fear of him; he had backed out and fired a 

 signal shot, We all three went into the forest on foot 



