“No, Nat, you could not,” he replied laughing; “but it is very beautiful all the same. I have travelled a great deal, and have seen some wonderful scenery, but I have never met with so much beauty condensed in so small a space.”
We kept on walking, but it was only to stop every now and then before some fresh find—sometimes it would be a curiously-shaped orchid, or a pitcher-plant half full of dead insects. Then some great forest tree full of sweet-scented blossoms, and alive with birds and insects, would arrest our attention; or down in some moist hollow, where a tiny stream trickled from the rocks, there would be enormous tree-ferns springing up twelve or fifteen feet above us, and spreading their beautiful fronds like so much glorious green lace against the sky. A fern is always a beautiful object, but these tree-ferns were more than beautiful—they were grand.
The farther we went the more beauties we found, and we kept on noting down places to visit again where there were palm and other trees full of fruit, which evidently formed the larder of various kinds of beautiful birds. We could have shot enough in that walk to have kept us busy making skins for days, but we kept to the determination my uncle had made, not to shoot any more that day, except once, when the curious hoarse cry of some bird of paradise, answered by others at a distance, tempted us away.
“Birds of paradise are exceptions, Nat,” said my uncle, smiling. “We must get them when we can.”
I immediately seemed to see the beautiful bird flying amongst the trees, with its lovely buff plumes trailing behind like so much live sunshine, and glancing once at my gun to see that the cartridges were in all right, I crept cautiously on amongst the trees on one side as Uncle Dick made a bit of a curve round in another, so that we had a good many great forest trees between us, whose foliage we carefully watched as we went cautiously on.
Every now and then, after a silence that made us think that our labour was all in vain, and we were about to give up, the loud harsh cry would come echoing from amongst the trees, and always seeming so near that I thought I must get a shot at the bird in a moment or two, and I bent down and crept on as quietly as I could, till the tree from which the sound seemed to come was reached.
Then I would stand ready to fire, watching carefully for a shot, peering amongst the boughs, and fancying a dozen times over that I could catch glimpses of the bird amongst the leaves, when, as if laughing at me for my pains, the cry would come again from a couple of hundred yards away, and the chase went on.
I did not shout to Uncle Dick, for by stopping to listen now and then I could hear the rustling of the leaves and twigs as he went on, besides every now and then catching through the dim light a glimpse of his face.
Once or twice, when a beautiful bird sprang up between us, my heart began to beat more quickly, for I thought that if uncle was tempted to shoot at it he might hit me; but by degrees I grew more confident and walked boldly on, feeling that I had nothing to fear.
That bird must have led us for miles. Every time we were ready to give up, the hoarse cry rang out again, and we followed once more, feeling sure that sooner or later we must get a shot at it, or at one of the others which kept answering from a distance; but at last I heard a peculiar whistle from where my uncle would be, and I forced my way through the undergrowth and joined him.