92 
First Impressions in Virgin Forest. 
are now and again cleared of the rank-growing weeds. If an entirely 
new field is to be opened, the planting is also done with “sticks”: the 
soil is onh loosened somewhat in the spots where they are stuck about 
one foot deep in the ground. The Indian however lays out such new 
plantations only a short time before the heavy rainy season. 
318. All the pictures my imagination had painted in anticipation of 
the impression a virgin forest would make on me sank like laded shadows 
into insignificance before the sublime Kealitv that disclosed itself on 
entering it. In mute delight 1 stood in front of the mighty giants that 
had seen hundreds of years pass by, and yet with the same unimpaired 
vital powers were pressing their trunks to heaven and their far-reaching 
branches to every point of the compass. Huge Lecythis with ungainly 
“root-necks” (irurzelhälsen) , Laurineae, Leguminosae, the giant 
Hipnenaea Courbaril Linn., Carapa guianensis Alibi., Couratari guianen- 
sis Aubl., Mimosa guianensis Aubl., Goupia glabra Aubl., and Bombax 
alobosum Aubl. were striving to fight for every free inch of space. They 
were all bound and tangled together with lengthy bush-ropes that cross- 
ed each other like ships’ tackling, and the bush ferns were so matted and 
interlocked with countless Rignoniaceae and Convolvulaceac, that all 
these rank growths had to be destroyed before a way could be forced in 
between them. When 1 turned to look up at the trunks and branches 
there smiled at me through the semi-obscurity prevailing over the whole 
forest, fresh tumid mosses and lichens, pretty ferns, most beautiful 
Orchids and Avoids, the white or greenish aerial roots of which almost 
reached down to earth, and numbers of magnificent Tillandsiae with 
their lovely scarlet-red flowers. 
319. The further T followed the Indian trail the thicker became the 
vegetation for which reason T did not venture to stray far without a 
guide. The noiseless repose was only here and there disturbed by the 
Indian ravens (Psittacus Araraima and Macao Linn.) as they flew out 
of the thickly leaved branches of the Leguminosae in the long pods of 
which they had already found their breakfast and. now interrupted by 
me, were swarming with deafening noise around the nooks from which 1 
could lie seen. All of a sudden, a much shriller scream, coming from an 
immense Carapa , made me forget my resolution about not wandering off 
the path. Taking everything at the jump I hurried tb the tree where 
I found a whole collection of Falco nudicollis Hand. The ear splitting 
din was usually started by one of the company, the others then joining 
in chorus: their note differs entirely from that of other species of fal- 
con. Xot far from this noisy throng was perched a much quieter party of 
beautiful Falco fnreatus Linn., while others of the same species were 
swaying in broad circles round their restful mates. 
320. With my curiosity satisfied, I hurried back to the path that soon 
led me from the hill down to a swampy valley through which the Cumaka 
was running its slow course. The vegetation had assumed another char- 
acter. The foliage trees had disappeared, their places being taken by 
the loveliest palms, Manicaria saccifera Gaert., Euterpe oleracea 
Mart., Maximil iana regia Mart., and Oenocarpus Bataua Mart, 
the enormous trunks of which almost seemed to have exercis- 
ed a damaging effect upon their more diminutive relatives loit- 
ering clOvser to the ground, because the undergrowth was entirely 
