48 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. 



then we entered a clear glade festooned by a maze of ropes 

 and cables, with here and there a lofty monkey-ladder lead- 

 ing upward by a wavy series of narrow steps. The cicadas 

 filled the air with the oriental droning of their song, and a 

 big Red-crested Woodpecker™ called loudly from a half- 

 rotted, vine-choked tree. From the undergrowth came a 

 soft rolling trill, a crescendo of power and sweetness, and 

 when our Indian carrier whispered, "Gallina del monie," we 

 knew we were listening to the call of a Great Blue Tinamou^ — 

 one of those strange birds looking like brown, tailless fowls, but 

 of so generalized a type that they form in many ways a link 

 between the ostrich -like forms and the rest of the bird world. 

 The bird which was calling soon became silent, but creeping 

 slowly along we were fortunate enough to discover its nest 

 on a bit of sunny turf near the end of a log in a partially over- 

 grown clearing. All the delights of bird-nesting seemed con- 

 summated the moment we caught sight of the two wonderful 

 eggs before us. The nest was merely a hollow scratched in 

 the grass, but the sun was reflected from two shining spheres 

 of metallic greenish blue, like two huge turquoises polished 

 as by the wheel of a lapidary. Never were such eggs; they 

 seemed of hard burnished metal, more akin to the stones 

 lying about them than to the organic world, and yet, even as 

 we looked, there appeared a tiny fracture, and in a few 

 minutes the beak of a Tinamou chick had broken through to 

 the outer air. The glistening cradle of stone would soon 

 fall apart and give to the tropical world another life — one 

 more mote among the millions upon millions about us. 



Now and then we would come across a huge low mound, 

 clear of undergrowth, dotted with holes from which well- 

 trodden paths led off in every direction. Some of these were 

 six inches in width, so that we coidd easily walk in them. 

 A twig poked down the holes and twisted about would come 

 up covered with angry ants, great brownish-black fellows 



