128 UP THE RIVER OF TAPIRS [chap, v 



Camp was pitched beside the ranch buildings. In the 

 trees near the tents grew wonderful violet orchids. 



Many birds were around us ; I saw some of them, 

 and Cherrie and Miller many, many more. They ranged 

 from party-coloured macaws, green parrots, and big 

 gregarious cuckoos down to a briUiant green- and-chest- 

 nut kingfisher, five and a quarter inches long, and a tiny 

 orange-and green manakin, smaller than any bird I have 

 ever seen except a hummer. We also saw a bird that 

 really was protectively coloured : a kind of whip-poor- wUl, 

 which even the sharp-eyed naturalists could only make 

 out because it moved its head. We saw orange-bellied 

 squirrels with showy orange tails. Lizards were common. 

 We killed our first poisonous snake (the second we had 

 seen), an evU lance-headed jararaca that was swimming 

 the river. We also saw a black-and-orange harmless 

 snake, nearly eight feet long, which we were told was 

 akin to the mussurama ; and various other snakes. One 

 day while paddling in a canoe on the river, hoping that 

 the dogs might drive a tapir to us, they drove into the 

 water a couple of small bush-deer instead. There was 

 no point in shooting them ; we caught them with ropes 

 thrown over their heads ; for the naturahsts needed 

 them as specimens, and aU of us needed the meat. 

 One of the men was stung by a single big red maribundi 

 wasp. For twenty-four hours he was in great pain and 

 incapacitated for work. In a lagoon two of the dogs 

 had the tips of their tails bitten of by piranhas as they 

 swam, and the ranch hands told us that in this lagoon 

 one of their hounds had been torn to pieces and com- 

 pletely devoured by the ravenous fish. It was a further 

 illustration of the uncertainty of temper and behaviour 

 of these ferocious httle monsters. In other lagoons they 

 had again and again left us and our dogs unmolested. 



