The world of the great forest

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

Then came a long silence; the guanioniens were fast asleep.

The following morning they greeted each other, then started for the Land of Plenty to visit their nest, which they had done every year for a long time past. They flew in a bee-line. They knew their way perfectly well through the air; but how, no one in the forest could tell but guanioniens themselves. They had to travel over a thousand miles before reaching their nest. Now and then they looked down upon the forest to see if any branches were moving at the tops of the trees. This would be a sign that monkeys were there. When they suspected that it was so, they would soar above them, peeping deeply into the branches, but that day they were unsuccessful.

Toward sunset they saw two giant trees growing close together, well known to them, and upon these they perched for the night. After they alighted they looked all around. They saw some nut-bearing trees, and the big guanionien said to his mate, “Let us soar over these trees to-morrow morning; perhaps we shall discover monkeys feeding on their tops. We shall have to be patient, for as you know, dear, prey sometimes shows itself at the last hour and when least expected. We cannot well undertake this long journey without food.”

Then they went to sleep. Early the next morning they saw from their resting-place branches of trees moving in several places, and knew that troops of monkeys were feeding. At once they left and soared over the monkeys and succeeded in capturing two, which they carried to the tree where they had spent the night, and devoured them.

After this bountiful repast they said, “Now that we have had a fine meal we can reach our destination without difficulty.”

In the afternoon a small black spot rose above the horizon in the east. It gradually grew larger and larger against the sky, in spite of the wind which blew against it.

The old guanionien flew to his mate and said: “Dear, by the look of the sky a tornado will soon be upon us; the wind will blow fiercely. Let us find a tree upon which we can shelter ourselves, for we are not strong enough to fly against the tornado, and we could not possibly go with the wind, for we do not know where it would take us. It might carry us to a country we do not know.”

They looked around them and saw a tall tree, and flew toward it as fast as their wings could carry them, and soon were perched in its centre, being protected thus by its big trunk and many branches. They knew that these would partly break the force of the fearful wind. They had met with many tornadoes during their lives.

They faced the black spot, for they knew that the tornado was to blow from that direction, then sunk their huge talons deeply into the wood on the branch on which they were perched, so as to have a powerful hold and not be carried away when the tornado fell upon them. They made themselves as small as they could by bending their legs, and shortening their necks.

They had hardly prepared themselves for their conflict with the tornado when the wind blowing against the black spot stopped, then came a calm, the precursor of the tornado. A white spot rose from the horizon under the now huge black mass that had gathered. It was the tornado. In the twinkling of an eye with terrific force it struck the tree upon which the guanioniens were. The wind hissed through branches, many of which bent as if ready to break, but the guanioniens had chosen a good place. Nevertheless, they had a hard time to hold on and not to be blown away.