In the rivers, and different creeks, you number six species of the kingfisher. They make their nest in a hole in the sand on the side of the bank. Wherever there is a wild fig-tree ripe, a numerous species of birds, called Tangara, is sure to be on it. There are 18 beautiful species here. Their plumage is very rich and diversified; some of them boast six different colours.
Parrots and paroquets are very numerous here, and of many different kinds. The hia-hia parrot, called in England the parrot of the sun, is very remarkable. He can erect at pleasure a fine radiated circle of tartan feathers quite around the back of his head from jaw to jaw. Superior in size and beauty to every parrot of South America, the ara will force you to take your eyes from the rest of animated nature and gaze at him. His commanding strength, the flaming scarlet of his body, the lovely variety of red, yellow, blue, and green in his wings, the extraordinary length of his blue and scarlet tail, seem all to join and demand for him the title of emperor of all the parrots.
There are nine species of the goatsucker in Demerara, a bird with prettily mottled plumage like that of the owl. Its cry is so remarkable that, once heard it can never be forgotten. When night reigns over these wilds you will hear this goatsucker lamenting like one in deep distress. A stranger would never conceive the cry to be that of a bird. He would say it was the departing voice of a midnight murdered victim, or the last wailing of Niobe for her poor children, before she was turned into stone.
Suppose yourself in hopeless sorrow, begin with a high loud note, and pronounce "ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha," each note lower and lower, till the last is scarcely heard, pausing a moment or two betwixt every note, and you will have some idea of the moaning of the goatsucker of Demerara. You will never persuade the native to let fly his arrow at these birds. They are creatures of omen and of reverential dread. They are the receptacles of departed souls come back to earth, unable to rest for crimes done in their days of nature.
III.—Third Journey
Gentle reader, after staying a few months in England, I strayed across the Alps and the Apennines, and returned home, but could not tarry. Guiana still whispered in my ear, and seemed to invite me once more to wander through her distant forests. In February, 1820, I sailed from the Clyde, on board the Glenbervie, a fine West Indiaman.
Sad and mournful was the story we heard on entering the river Demerara. The yellow fever had swept off numbers of the old inhabitants, and the mortal remains of many a new comer were daily passing down the streets, in slow and mute procession.
I myself was soon attacked severely by the fever, but was fortunate enough to recover after much suffering. Next I was wounded painfully in the foot by treading on a hard stump, while pursuing a red woodpecker in the depths of the forest. The wound healed in about three weeks, and I again joyfully sallied forth.
Let us now turn attention to the sloth, whose haunts have hitherto been so little known. He is a scarce and solitary animal, living in trees, and being good food, is never allowed to escape. He inhabits remote and gloomy forests, where snakes take up their abode, and where cruelly stinging ants and scorpions, and swamps, and innumerable thorny shrubs and bushes obstruct the steps of civilized man. We are now in the sloth's own domain.
Some years ago I kept a sloth in my room for several months. I often took him out of the house and placed him on the ground. If the ground were rough, he would pull himself forward, by means of his forelegs, at a pretty good pace. He invariably shaped his course at once towards the nearest tree. But if I put him on a smooth and well-trodden part of the road, he appeared to be in trouble and distress. His favourite abode was the back of a chair, and after getting all his legs in a line on the topmost part of it, he would hang there for hours together, and often with a low and inward cry, would seem to invite me to take notice of him.