The tucano (Ramphastos) is too well known for me to describe it fully again. It is found all over tropical Brazil. There are many different varieties, such as the Ramphastos vitellinus, Ramphastos ariel, the Ramphastos Cuvieri, the Pteroglossus Beauharnaisii, or curl-crested tucano, etc., extremely common, especially farther north, near the borders of the Amazon.
I was sorry when my men killed this beautiful bird. I had watched it for some time, with its inquisitive habits, hopping from branch to branch, peeping its bill into cavities and examining everything that happened below by bending its head attentively, now on one side then on the other. It evidently took intelligent interest in our doings. My men had gone out to do their cooking. The bird watched them with the greatest attention—with jerky movements not unlike those of a magpie.
The tucanos have, I believe, been described as being stupid; but on the contrary I think they are extremely clever—quite as clever as many parrots or macaws. I observed how shrewd that particular bird was. It would come quite close to us, and examine with really amazing attention what we were doing as long as we were not taking any notice of it, but the moment a man happened to touch a stone or try to point a rifle at it, it would fly a long distance off, with shrill yelps, and would not return until it was quite sure that we were not noticing its presence.
The uses of the enormous bill of the tucano have often been discussed by ornithologists, many of whom believe that the bill is of no use to that bird and Nature made in this case a mistake and has not yet had time to rectify it. Scientists frequently allege that Nature makes mistakes, because many of them have never really understood Nature. How could they? They have never been near enough to Nature unspoiled. Many of them also believe that tucano birds are great fishers, following the notion that many water birds have red or yellow bills of large size. That, too, is another great mistake, for the tucano is eminently a fruit and nut eater, and of course a feeder on worms and insects contained in fruit.
The huge bill, attaining the length of six or seven inches, is toothed at the sides in order to be able to saw the stems of fruit. The shape and size of the bill, far from being a mistake of nature, are made so in order to enable that bird to dig holes into the bark of trees and to enable it to crush and chew the many curiously shaped fruits found in certain parts of the Brazilian forest. Moreover, the bill is also a great protection to the head in going through the dense foliage, where thorns are innumerable and alive with dangerous insects of great size, which can, owing to the length of its beak, be destroyed at a distance from the bird's most vital organs.
These birds have received the name tucano from the noise they make, which resembles "tok-kan" very sharply pronounced and with a snap at the end of each syllable.
The tucanos are good climbers, but not good fliers. In fact, their flight is somewhat clumsy and heavy. They seldom fly long distances. They spend all their time on the higher branches of trees. They are generally to be seen alone or in couples, or perhaps occasionally in flocks of three or four.
What spare moments I had in Castanho—after the storm was over—I spent on the banks of the river looking at the magnificent stream.
Looking south, a low hill range could be seen in the distance with a conical summit rising slightly above the range—the Serra do Cayapo. It was there, as I have said, that the great Araguaya had its birth. It was interesting to note that the head waters of the Araguaya—flowing north, of course—had their birth within an infinitesimal distance of those of two such immense rivers as the Inducassu and the Sucuru, flowing into the Parana, and also near the somewhat unknown Taquary River flowing into the Paraguay.
It would be possible—although perhaps expensive—by means of raised artificial lakes and locks actually to join at least one of these southern great rivers to the great Araguaya, and thus—barring some troublesome rapids—form a continuous waterway from south to north across South America, from Buenos Ayres, roughly in Lat. 34° 5′ south, to Pará in Lat. 1° 27′ 6″ South. Imagine a distance by river extending for 33° 37′ 54″ (or 3,737 kil.) in a straight line—as the crow flies—and not less than double that distance if we include the constant turns and deviations in the various connected rivers.