152 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 
a few feet away, an ascending, liquid whoo- 
eep! whooeep! and the burden of song passed 
from the sleepy antbirds to the awakening 
world of small frogs. 
Even the relative proximity of the canal and 
the batteries and human beings was forgotten 
when some jungle cat—ocelot or jaguar— 
snarled twice upstream, and this was reinforced 
by a muttering roll of thunder and a stray, 
momentary breeze which shook every leaf. In 
the last ten minutes of daylight I saw two nests 
overhanging the water. I reached the first and 
found it an old hummingbird’s home, fashioned 
of cottony seeds, which were fraying out, and 
drifting a second time to earth. The other was 
a yellow flycatcher’s pinch of tide-drift and it 
was shaking when I first discovered it. Before 
I reached it, a lizard shot forth and along the 
branch. It too was empty of eggs and old. 
Night came with a rush and we hastily made 
all our preparations for darkness. My jack was 
electric, my companion’s an acetylene bull’s eye 
which buckled around his forhead. After this 
our world consisted of the tiny circle which our 
shaft of light picked out on water, rock or 
foliage. All else was impenetrable, absolute 
darkness—apparent to us only through its feel, 
its sounds and smells. We had no lack of variety 
as regards the feel, for we worked up and down 
short stretches of two streams and connected 
each likely Yapock zone with longer or shorter 
trips through dense jungle. The potholes, so 
distinctly outlined in the daytime, now merged 
with the slippery water-covered stone and each 
step must be felt, or chances taken of a plunge. 
When once wet to the skin, we cut small holes 
in our pockets and haversacks to drain out the 
water and sought only to keep jack light and 
gun above the stirface. Later when it began 
to rain we ceased to worry even about that. To 
all intents and purposes we became Yapocks 
ouselves, and however little I knew about them, 
I at least have shared many of their feelings. 
The air and water were of equally pleasant 
temperature, every moment was filled with driv¬ 
ing interest, and every coming second with po¬ 
tential discovery. During one spell of watch¬ 
ful waiting I tried to think of some place in 
the world more preferable—and I failed. 
The pothole contingency was objectionable 
only because of the uncertainty of depth and 
diameter. If one plunged deep into a narrow 
hole and fell sideways a badly sprained ankle 
would result, and the inability to arrange cor¬ 
relation of muscles for a drop which might be 
six inches or six feet was trying. Early in the 
night I stepped out of the shallows on to a 
short, half submerged log, when the log turned 
into a steel spring, which flicked me backward 
into a seven-foot pothole. When I climbed out, 
my companion said that to the best of his knowl¬ 
edge the youthful crocodile which had exploded 
beneath me, was still barging full speed down 
stream, even more startled than I. As for me, 
in spite of many past experiences! had still been 
trying to keep my solar plexus dry, using much 
valuable effort to this useless end, and now I 
was equally and pleasantly soaked all over, and 
throughout the rest of the night, wasted no 
more thoughts on adventitious dry spots. 
Just as the source of all our visual knowledge 
came from the narrow circle of direct lighting, 
so the exact whereabouts of the living beings 
of the jungle was indicated by reflection—the 
pigment and ricli plexus of blood vessels of the 
retina glowing like fire in the light of the jack. 
We had hardly begun to move silently down 
stream when things occurred and were seen, 
quite otherwise than we diurnals know them. 
The change was casually initiated by the moan 
of an owl, the last sound before the young croc 
skittered me into the pothole. Beyond the upper 
part of a tinkling riffle a single glowing eye 
shone out, which never increased to two. After 
much peering, being rather nervous from my 
upset, my companion fired along his light shaft 
and bagged an unfortunate marine toad, which 
with a companion had come out upon the moss 
to seek for stray bits of food. His chagrin was 
great, for lie had hunted with jack light over 
this region many times. 
Ten steps more and I aimed at two points of 
light moving steadily over the rocks. Rushing 
over to the spot, and miraculously escaping a 
whole nest of potholes, I found that I had sunk 
still lower in the jack hunters’ scale, and had 
dismembered a huge crayfish, which had been 
sculling along on the surface of a shallow pool. 
We squatted silently and waited. The pool 
held four maneholas, elongated, mottled fish, 
sleeping quite soundly with wide open eyes, their 
bodies resting on narrow ledges, often with head 
and tail unsupported. Creeping over the bot¬ 
tom was a host of small shrimps, each with a 
glowing pair of stalked eyes, the pool appearing 
full of restless rubies. Close behind me, a pot¬ 
hole re-echoed with a cheerful ivhoooeep! whooo- 
eep! and the jack turned gradually upon them 
caused no disturbance—it was to them merely 
the moon risen before her time. Flattened upon 
the surface were two male whooping frogs, 
Eupermphix pustulosus, pale brown, and each 
