3724 Natural-History Collectors. 



one cares to walk, even on the most trivial journeys, and I soon dis- 

 covered that much more could be done in collecting on horseback 

 than on foot, for the difficulties in collecting here require great endur- 

 'ance and strength to keep up under their exhausting nature. One 

 must be up an hour before sun-rise, and after a hasty breakfast of fa- 

 rinha mixed in coffee, saddle the horse and mount him for a ride to 

 the nearest point of the forest, to be on the ground for the early in- 

 sects. My clothing consisted of a pair of cotton trowsers, a shirt, hat 

 and belt, — nothing more, — no shoes or stockings. I have heard some 

 incredulous people express a doubt about Mr. Waterton's statement 

 that he walked barefooted through the forests of Demerara ; but one 

 day's experience in these forests would be enough to confirm full be- 

 lief in that gentleman's statements. Strapped to my back is a double- 

 barrelled gun, with a pair of pistols in my belt, — according to the 

 reports of robbers and murderers. On one side of my horse hangs 

 the net and stick, and on the other the collecting-box. In this light 

 costume I ride out for nine miles to the forests ; dismounting and 

 hobbling the horse so as to allow him to feed, I make my way up a 

 ' picardo,' a road cut through the forest so as to admit three horse- 

 men abreast : and now one soon discovers how impossible it would 

 be to walk with shoes on. H«re is a rivulet to get over, and there 

 being no little wooden bridge across it, one must walk through it. 

 Soon after one meets with a swamp, then a bog, and so on all day. 

 No leather, except that sun-tanned hide which Nature has fitted so 

 tightly over our feet, would last an hour of such wear and tear. 



" Insects are not to be met with in swarms about the forests ; they are 

 as scarce to the sight as in England, and much more difficult to cap- 

 ture : for should you miss securing it by the first stroke of the net, the 

 butterfly is gone out of sight in a moment. It is but rarely that an 

 insect is observed settling upon the ground or on the trees, and Cole- 

 opterous insects do not, — as is the case with numbers of species in 

 England, — harbour under stones, moss, or bark ; they are only seen 

 on the wing, darting by with great rapidity. The sides of the ' pi- 

 cardo ■ are a dense mass of foliage, interwoven with a net-work of 

 creeping plants, through which a way must be cut, so that frequently 

 when I have had the chance of a shot at a rare bird, it will take an 

 hour to cut into the 'mato' to'the spot where it seemed to fall. I 

 am sure that specimens of birds sell much below their value in Eng- 

 land, considering the danger and difficulty there is in shooting them 

 and preparing the skins. The toil in a burning sun, with the thermo-. 

 meter at 96°, even in the shade, — the wearying march through mud 



