THE SCREW-PALM (Pandanus).
The open country was therefore not the best territory for me, for there was but little game. On the other hand I reaped a more abundant harvest in the scrubs, where there is a greater variety of animal life; and to wander with the blacks in these almost impenetrable jungles in the wide river valley was very interesting. Nothing escapes their notice. On one occasion, in the middle of September, when I made an excursion with one of them, he made me understand that he wished to go away for a moment to look for something. Time passed, and I became impatient, but when I began to shout for him I was not a little surprised to hear his response coming from the far distance above. Approaching, I discovered him in the top of an immensely high tree. He threw down to me two large young of the gigantic wader Jabiru (Mycteria australis). Quickly, and with the dexterity of an acrobat, he descended, laying hold with his hands of the twining plants which hung like natural ropes down the trunk of the tree.
It is not easy to penetrate this scrub, which is so dense that one has scarcely elbow-room; but along the rivers there is more breathing space. Here beautiful landscapes are often disclosed to view; the most varied trees vie with each other for a place along the quiet stream; while creeping and twining plants hang in beautiful festoons over the water.
On first entering the scrub, the solemn quiet and solitude which reign there are striking. You work your way through it by the sweat of your brow; you startle a bird, which at once disappears, and your prevailing impression is that there is no life. But if you come there in the early morning or towards evening, and sit down quietly, it is surprising to see the birds approaching gently, as if they had been called, and disappearing as noiselessly as they came. Silence as a rule reigns in the scrubs, and the song of birds is rarely heard; though the doves coo in the evening, and sometimes the melancholy note of the jungle-hen is to be heard, or even, if you are lucky, the thundering voice of the cassowary.
One of the first birds you notice is the cat-bird (Ælurœdus maculosus), which makes its appearance towards evening, and has a voice strikingly like the mewing of a cat. The elegant metallic-looking “glossy starlings” (Callornis metallica) greedily swoop with a horrible shriek upon the fruit of the Australian cardamom[[7]] tree. The ingenious nests of this bird were found in the scrubs near Herbert Vale—a great many in the same tree. Although this bird is a starling, the colonists call it “weaver-bird.”
[7]. This is a fictitious name, as are the names of many Australian plants and animals. The tree belongs to the nutmeg family, and its real name is Myristica insipida. The name owes its existence to the similarity of the fruit to the real cardamom. But the fruit of the myristica has not so strong and pleasant an odour as the real cardamom, and hence the tree is called insipida.
There are few birds that look better in the green tree-tops than the Torres Strait pigeons (Carpophaga spilorrhoa), which is white, like a ptarmigan in winter dress, with the exception of its wings and tail, which are black. In November a pair of them built their nest in a high tree near the, scrub, and like several other varieties of birds, had just arrived from the northernmost part of Queensland and New Guinea; for it was now spring, and all the birds that migrate northward in the winter had returned, such as the celebrated Australian giant cuckoos (Scythrops novæ-hollandiæ), whose terrible shrieks are heard at a great distance when in scores they gorge themselves in the large fig-trees. On the banks of a stream I shot a specimen of the very small kingfisher (Ceyx pusilla), which belongs to New Guinea and Northern Australia. It was the only specimen I saw on Herbert river. The racket-tail kingfisher (Tanysiptera) has also been shot in the scrubs here.
But what especially gives life and character to these woods are the jungle-hens (mound-builders), which I have already mentioned. The weird, melancholy cry of these birds once heard is not easily forgotten; at sunset and in the twilight of the evening it is in perfect harmony with the stillness and repose of nature. The bird is of a brownish hue, with yellow legs and immensely large feet; hence its name Megapodius. It is very shy, and therefore it is not easy to get a glimpse of it, but its remarkable nests, which are formed of large heaps of earth and decayed leaves, like those of the talegalla, are frequently to be found in the scrubs. From my own experience I venture to assert that the mounds of the jungle-hen are larger than those of the talegalla. For many years they were thought to be the burying-grounds of the natives, says Mr. Eden, who mentions one which was sixteen feet high and sixty-two feet in circumference at the base. One would hardly think that birds could build so large a mound.
In these scrubs the proud cassowary, the stateliest bird of Australia, is also to be found. I had already made several vain attempts to secure a specimen of this beautiful and comparatively rare creature. We had frequently seen traces of it under the large fig-trees, the fruit of which it eats. The excrement of the cassowary looks more like that of a horse than of a bird, and I saw large heaps under the fig-trees. We often approached without seeing it, for it is exceedingly shy and departs on the slightest noise, consequently it is very difficult to get a shot.