CHAPTER IV. 
Setting in of the Rainy Season — Sicarniing of, a}id gathering the Termes 
destructor and Atta cephalotes — Fhanacus Jasins and Mimas — 
Meteorological obsercations — Getting the houses ready for the 
wet season — Moisture of the temperature and of the ground — 
Return of Hamlet to Georgetown — Despatch of Hendrick a)id 
Reuter there — Enumeration of the, troublesome and danger- 
ous animals that the rainy season drives into the tiouses 
— Flora of the rainy season at Firara — Visit from Brazilians- 
Blighted hopes of a broken fast — Influence of the atmosphere 
on the lives of the Indians — Youd's Reeall — His departure for 
London — His death, and its consequences for Pirara — Treat- 
ment of snake-bite by the IntH'ins — Meteorological observations 
from May to August — Return, of Hendrick and Reuter from 
Georgetown — Recall of the Military — Dismissal and death of 
Reuter — Manatus atnericanus — Baru — Demolition of Fort NoiV 
Guinea — Another excursion to the Canuku Ranges — Coracina 
militaris. 
219. The harbingers of the rainy season (the Conno of the Macusd) 
were becoming more numerous. With the vivid summer lightning that 
mostly played all night and covered the whole cupola of Heaven Avith 
an almost continuous phosphorescent blaze, was soon joined the appear- 
ance of three kinds of Avinged ants. Of these, the female insects when 
roasted, were regarded as very great delicacies by tlie Indians, on which 
account the gathering of them attorded plenty of occupation to both old 
and young. Though, like sAvalloAvs AVith us, they only appeared singly at 
first, tlie swarms of Termes destr)ictor (Woodlouse of the Colonists) 
multiplied daily in increasing proportion and Ave re finally borne on the 
air like heavy rain-clouds, to become Avlien fallen to earth, the prey of the 
ugly lizard Ecphymotes torgiiatus, as well ns of tAvo other kinds of ant, 
of several birds, and particularly of Indians. 
220. The Avinged insects having left their ant-hills in the savannah, 
the Avhole village population, all making a roAV and shouting, betakes 
itself each evening to the edge of the neighltouring Avooded oases, where 
they light liuge fires around Avhich the ants Av'ill swarm in ever-decreasing 
circles until, Avhat Avith Avings singed and burnt, they are collected by the 
noisy croAvd in drinking cups or small baskets. I ncA^er missed these 
trips: they had a ]M>culiar fascination for me for it was the m^ost illusiive 
realisation of the Brocken scene in Goethe's Faust or the Saga of the 
Harz, when the nude brown figures, young and old, would caper wildly 
around the huge bonfires, and at the same time raise their voices, which 
to my German ear seemed to represent the unbridled gambols of a crowd 
of underground hobgoblins ratlier than those of my fellow brothers and 
sisters. 
