FIRST JOURNEY. 



9 



in the muddy islands on the coasts of Pomauron ; the 

 egrets and crabiers in the same place. They resort to 

 the mud-flats at ebbing water, while thousands of sand- 

 pipers and plovers, with here and there a spoonbill and 

 flamingo, are seen amongst them. The pelicans go farther 

 out to sea, but return at sundown to the courada trees. 

 The humming-birds are chiefly to be found near the 

 flowers at which each of the species of the genus is 

 wont to feed. The pie, the gallinaceous, the columbine, 

 and passerine tribes, resort to the fruit-bearing trees. 

 You never fail to see the common vulture where 

 there is carrion. In passing up the river 



The vulture. £ . 



there was an opportunity 01 seeing a pair 01 

 the king of the vultures ; they were sitting on the naked 

 branch of a tree, with about a dozen of the common ones 

 with them. A tiger had killed a goat the day before ; 

 he had been driven away in the act of sucking the 

 blood, and not finding it safe or prudent to return, the 

 goat remained in the same place where he had killed it ; 

 it had begun to putrefy, and the vultures had arrived 

 that morning to claim the savoury morsel. 



At the close of day, the vampires leave the hollow 



trees, whither they had tied at the morning's 



The vampire. J ° 



dawn, and scour along the river s banks in 

 quest of prey. On waking from sleep, the astonished 

 traveller finds his hammock all stained with blood. It 

 is the vampire that hath sucked him. Not man alone, 

 but every unprotected animal, is exposed to his depre- 

 dations ; and so gently does this nocturnal surgeon 

 draw the blood, that, instead of being roused, the 

 patient is lulled into a still profounder sleep. There 

 are two species of vampire in Demerara, and both suck 

 living animals : one is rather larger than the common 



