Chapter VI: A Gold Mine in the Wilderness (2)

On the first day of our arrival, even before we came in sight of the clearing, we heard the cries of the splendid big Orioles or Cassiques, known all over Guiana as Bunyahs. In the creek bed below the dam, but within the radius of the clearing, stood a medium sized tree and among its branches a colony of Scarlet-backed Cassiques[152] were flying back and forth from their nests.

We made a mental note of them at the time but passed on without giving them more than a glance. Later near the bungalow we occasionally saw them in small numbers associating, as we have already stated, with the Lavender Jays.[161]

As we wished to take a number of young Cassiques back to New York with us and to study the colony as thoroughly as we could in the space of a week’s time, we started out early one morning for the Cassiques’ tree. The long pendent nests were all seventy feet or more from the ground. Taking the rusty climbing irons from their case, we recalled vividly the last time they had been in use—a cold June day in Nova Scotia, when the nesting hole of a Three-toed Woodpecker had been the goal. How different were these tropical surroundings!

Bravely the start up the tree was made; jab and pull, jab and pull, while the straps pressed in on ankle and knee, giving that peculiar sensation that cannot be described, but which every climbing naturalist knows so well. Ten, twenty, thirty feet were scaled, and then one’s hand on the opposite side of the trunk broke through some tiny earthen tunnels, and, like many an unfortunate telegraph-line-man, struck a live wire. At least, the sensation was very much the same, only the electric shocks were here progressive, and when they had reached the elbow, they were seen to be a numerous and enthusiastically defensive horde of ants. At one end a pair of jaws gave a firm point of leverage and attachment, whereby the insect could secure a footing while operating the sting from the opposite end of his anatomy.

There have been martyrs to science as well as religion, but much as one might desire to look into those nests only forty feet above, it may be doubted if any man could have controlled his feelings and coördinated his muscles sufficiently to continue the ascent. The details of the descent were hazy; an exceedingly rough trunk seemed to shoot upward through one’s embrace until the ground was reached and the Cassiques screamed their delight.

They had seen many of the four-handed folk foiled in a similar manner, and now this new enemy, who scaled the trunk with two hands and two spurs was equally baffled by the tiny allies of the birds!

But study the colony we must, and selecting a line of soft, springy underbrush, we had an Indian drop the tree on it A cloud of screaming Cassiques followed it to earth, scattering only as we ran up and began to gather the young birds. Out of the first nest there rushed a lizard about a foot in length, brown, with head and fore-legs bright green. He scurried like a streak of light across the red tailings, the speed sending him up on his hind legs, so that his track was bipedal.

Before we describe the condition of the colony as we found it when we reached the fallen tree, it will be interesting to record its early history as far as we know it. This was the first year of this colony of Cassiques, as last year there were none nearer the clearing than the mouth of Hoorie Creek, three and one-half miles away, where in a tree, overhanging the house of a black, a colony has been in existence for two years. Three months ago, in January, one Scarlet-backed Cassique was observed in the clearing at the mine, but it soon vanished. Within a few days, however, a number of these birds appeared, perhaps guided by the solitary scout. They set to work at once, establishing their new colony in the tree which we had cut down. So at the time we began to study this colony, it could not have been older than three months.

The tree stood alone in the centre of the tailings from the gold washing and 20 or 30 feet away from all the surrounding trees. The finely sifted sediment of the tailings had broadened out the water of the creek bed so that it flowed delta-like on both sides of the tree. With their characteristic intelligence, the Cassiques had taken advantage of this unusual condition, and were thus guarded from enemies, by the water, by the isolation from other trees and by the far more formidable stinging ants which probably for many years had had their home on the trunk of the tree. The little bird city as we found it contained 39 homes; three-quarters of which were on one branch, 70 feet from the ground, while 10 were suspended from a smaller branch, a few feet lower down. Of the 39 nests, 4 were only half finished, while 10 were empty, having been already used and deserted this season. The others may be divided as follows:

One nest contained an addled egg; white with brownish spots
chiefly at the larger end.

One nest had one egg containing a week old embryo.

Two nests each had a skeleton of a well grown young bird; one
of which had been caught about the neck, and the other about
the legs by fine flexible tendrils which had caused their
deaths.

There were altogether 28 young birds: 9 full-fledged, 16 with
feathers just appearing, while 3 were recently hatched. They
were distributed as follows:

14 nests contained 1 young bird.
7 nests contained 2 young birds.

The special distribution was as follows:

_Number and Condition of Young._ _Number of Nests._

2 well-fledged young in 2 nests.
1 well-fledged young in 5 nests.
2 partly fledged young in 4 nests.
1 partly fledged young in 8 nests.
2 newly hatched birds in 1 nest.
1 newly hatched bird in 1 nest.

The nests were typically Cassique-like, made of stout rootlets and grasses, while at the lower end was a cup-shaped lining of very fine grass and root hairs, forming a soft bedding. The nests varied from thirteen to eighteen inches in length, and all but five had an upper roosting chamber, built on above the entrance. These five were built directly beneath a group of others, and the bases of the ones above served as protecting roofs. This was a most interesting adaptation to varying conditions. Just before felling the tree we noticed in several instances that both parents shared in the work of bringing food to the young ones. Almost all of the young were uninjured by the fall of the tree. Three were thrown out of the nests and these we chloroformed in order to find what their food had been. The stomach of one was crammed with white seeds of two kinds; one nearly round and about as large as the head of a pin, while the others were longer, perhaps one-third of an inch in length. Mingled with these seeds were remains of numerous insects; beetles, grasshoppers and caterpillars. The two other birds, which were younger, and almost bare of feathers, had received chiefly animal food, as follows:—

1. A three-inch, smooth caterpillar, medium sized spider, many
small bugs, and a mass of berry seeds.

2. Several one-inch cut-worms; spider; small iridescent beetle;
yellow butterfly; a few berry seeds.

The young birds were almost without down, the adult plumage being outlined very shortly after hatching. In a bird of only four or five days the dull orange or yellowish color of the rump feathers shows plainly. When these break through their sheaths, the color is a dull rose; becoming redder as the feathers increase in length, but not attaining the brilliant scarlet of the parent birds until the succeeding moult. When full grown, these birds measure about ten inches in length and are glossy black in color, save only for the brilliant scarlet rump. The bill is a conspicuous greenish white, while the feet are black. The eyes of the nestling are dark hazel in color, while in the old birds the iris is of a most beautiful greenish blue.

The voice of the very young birds is a shrill incessant _peep! peep!_ when they are gaping for food, but the half-fledged youngsters utter solitary harsher notes under the same conditions. The five fully fledged birds had learned what fear was and instead of feeding, crouched down at the bottom of the artificial nest which Mr. Crandall made for them. But hunger overcame fear and before night all had taken food. We kept an Indian busy gathering a berry or fruit which looked, tasted and smelled much like a miniature tomato. The leaves of this low plant are large, deeply incised and studded above and below with numerous thorns. The plant is from three to six feet in height, is abundant in the clearing, and forms the favorite vegetable food of the Cassiques. In addition to this, the young birds had a few mealworms and ants’ eggs from our small store, and all the soft insects which our Indian could capture. After two full days of grasshopper catching, the pride of the noble red-man began to feel itself injured, and additional inducements in the way of tobacco were needed to sustain his interest in his orthopterous pursuits.

On the following day the oldest of the young Cassiques flew feebly to a low perch and nothing could induce him to return to his fellows again. He uttered isolated call-notes, which however, at the approach of food, merged at once into the baby scream.

We had carried the young Cassiques a third of a mile to the veranda of the bungalow, where they were put out of sight and sound of their parents; yet early next morning four Cassiques had discovered their offspring and were flying back and forth close to the house carrying food in their beaks. In an hour no fewer than twenty Cassiques had collected, and on placing the young out in a low tree, the parents came at once and fed them.

One bird which we watched carefully brought masses of caterpillars which it inserted within the wide mouth of the young. Although the young birds were mixed up, five or six of the same size being placed together in one artificial nest, yet there was no question about recognition on the part of the old birds. At least there was no reckless undirected feeding; certain young were fed by certain adults.

The second day after we had taken the young birds, no Cassiques came to feed them, and we found the reason was that the entire flock had begun to found a new colony in the very nearest tree to the one we had cut down, about twenty feet away. This too was isolated and protected both by shallow water and by the vicious tunneling ants.

Some of the new nests must have been started the day before, as the roost chambers were complete and in several the top of the nest itself was finished. The rains had been rather heavy for a few days and may have influenced the early building of the shelters above the nest. To the three or four inches of nest the birds were bringing beakfuls of fibres, both sexes working energetically. We were glad to know that our wholesale destruction of the first colony site had wrought no permanent change. At the rate the birds were building, the second colony would be in a flourishing state in another two weeks.

These Red-backed Cassiques[152] together with their near relatives the Yellow-backs[153] are most interesting birds, and a careful study of the growth and daily routine of a colony would yield most valuable results. They seem to trust more to the presence of man as a protection against enemies than to the guardianship of wasps, but both methods are to be found. We traced these birds all the way up the Barama, and from what we could learn, none were found higher up, the colony at Hoorie Mine being the farthest outpost.

NIGHT LIFE.

Owing to our brief stay and the difficulty of exploration in this hilly and densely underwooded country, we gained little thorough knowledge of the vertebrate fauna hereabouts. The phase of tropical life which, during the week of our stay, was most striking, was the wonderful host of insects attracted by the electric lights in the evening. The bungalow contained four large rooms, two on each side of a wide central passage, extending through the house—a kind of interior veranda, open front and back. This was the dining room, where every day we feasted upon delicious dishes of peccary, tinamou, curassow and paca, or “bush-hog,” “maam,” “powie” and “labba,” as we learned to call them in the vernacular.

Here during the evening meal, after the lights were turned on, came legions of the most curious, the most beautiful winged creatures imaginable. We all turned entomologists and never tired of admiring the wonderful colors, and bizarre shapes which night after night were revealed in never-ending array. The first night Crandall sent up an excited call of “Get a vial! Get a vial!” and this became our vesper slogan. From the yard, or veranda, or room, or kitchen hut, would come the call from some of our party, “Get a vial!” and the one nearest the array of bottles in the improvised laboratory would hasten to the aid of the discoverer, who would probably be found with eyes glued to some strange creature and blindly reaching out behind for the approaching vial, in which to capture his prize.

There were few insects of very small size and many indeed were gigantic, as judged by our standards of the north. None were unpleasant and they seldom attempted suicide in soup or cocoa. They were content to flutter a moment about the electric globe and drop quietly to the white table-cloth. Praying mantises, or “rar-hosses” as our southern negroes call them, would whirr in and climb awkwardly over the bouquets of flowers, swaying from side to side and now and then reaching out for some passing insect, with a sudden unflexing of those murderous, deceptive fore-legs. One which flew on the table was a new species, which has been named _Stagmomantis hoorie_.[E] If exercise during meals is good for one’s digestion then we were hygienic in the extreme, for twenty times in succession we would have to go to the veranda laboratory to chloroform our captives.

The second evening, although a heavy rain was falling, a bewildering number of moths, mostly small but of exquisite patterns, dashed in between the drops. There were almost never two alike; indeed among one hundred species captured on two evenings, there were but two duplicates.

It is folly to try to describe with any exactness the beauty, even of the commonest, plainest insect, and how much more impossible to convey an accurate idea of these tropical beauties. Think of a sapling near an electric light covered with fifty or sixty exquisite moon moths (_Thysania agrippina_)—pale creamy white, banded and looped with lines of brown—none less than nine inches in spread of wing and many reaching an even foot across.

The hawk-moths that came to our table were all different, all beautiful; one a study in pale yellow; another variegated green with blended purples and red (_Argeus labruscae_) on the hinder wings. This one too bore on its eyes the long shaft of a pollen stalk from some night flowering orchid.

Then a moth would come, recalling somewhat the Promethea and Polyphemus of our childhood’s collecting, but with great transparent mirrors in the centre of the wings (_Attacus [Hesperia] erycina_); next, two as different as possible but which we learned later were sexes of the same species (_Dirphia tarquinia_)—the female, large, plain brown with a forked streak of light across the fore-wings: her mate a full third smaller with rosy hind-wings and fore-wings frosted white, save for two conspicuous circles at the fork of his white lightning.

On the third evening there were fewer moths, but many more beetles and grasshopper-like insects. Green was the predominating color among the moths this evening—from palest yellow-green to darkest bottle-green. In some the green had a border sending ray-like lines across all four wings. Yellow and white were the colors almost always present in combination with the green, the yellow being usually confined to the hinder wings. A stain of gold was sometimes laid over the green, and in one beauty the green seemed to have been spattered at hazard over a milky-white surface. This proved to be a female of a species known only from a single male (_Racheolopha nivetacta_) the female proving to be twice as large as her mate.

Instead of burying the insects in envelopes or mounting them in the orthodox way with the fore-wings raised unnaturally until the hind edge is at right angles to the body, we merely supported the wings, and allowed them to dry in the natural position. By doing this we usually lost sight of part of the hinder wing, but we gained the true relation of the spots and patterns on the fore-wings to those on the thorax and the result was in many instances surprising. For example, when spread, the fore-wings of one tiny moth (_Pronola fraterna_) showed two meaningless black spots forming each one-third of a circle. When closed naturally, these united with the black abdomen to form a perfect black circle stamped upon a mat of velvety cream color.

All words are inadequate to describe these exquisite creatures; one with the lightning flash of gold across its cloudy background; another, enscribed with Chinese hieroglyphics; a third of lavender, yellow and russet mosaics set about large transparent windows of opalescent blue.[F] One of the most exquisite was a little moth (_Chrysocestis fimbriaria_) spreading less than an inch, with wings of iridescent mother-of-pearl rimmed with dull golden, on which was set a score of embossed beads of the most brilliant gilt, flashing as no gem ever flashed.

If one could spend a season here studying the motions alone of these insects, it would well repay him. One moth, iridescent with a broad border of black (_Eudioptis hyalinata_), curled the abdomen straight up into the air, and separated its extremity into a wide-spread tuft of hairs. These radiated like the tentacles of a sea anemone, and when the whole was waved about, it looked like some strange crawling caterpillar, holding its head high above the prostrate wings of the moth.

The last evening, as if to make our departure still harder, the insects increased in number. Walking sticks five and six inches in length skimmed through the air, their bodies, legs and wings dark in color and ornamented with irregular scales and projections, until their resemblance to a jagged-barked twig was perfection. If this species were represented by thousands of individuals in its haunts, birds or four-footed enemies would soon learn to detect even such an exact counterfeit, and the protective value would be lost. But in the tropics the infinite variety is the key-note to success in protective adaptation. On the table-cloth at one time would be perfect green leaves (katydid-like orthopters), green leaves with large worm-eaten defects or spottings (some of the mantises) and many brown, lichened leaves and twigs (moths and walking sticks). Even if two of the same species appeared at once, the chances were that one would be much the larger and of an entirely different shade with a distinct individual pattern of mimic defects.

Big owl moths (_Hyperchiria liberia_, _H. nausica_, _Automeria cinctistriga_ and others) alternated with tree-hoppers of all sizes with branched and rebranched horns rising from their thoraxes (_Hemiptycha [Umbonia] spinosa_ and others). The prize of one evening was a grasshopper (_Pterochroya ocellata_) which came in on the sleeve of the coolie butler. It had alighted on the white cloth as he crossed the yard between the kitchen and the house. Its wide, jagged fore-wings met closely above the back, forming a half green, half brown leaf, complete even to the mid and side ribs. On the hind wings were what we could merely guess were either sexual ornaments or warning markings, visible only in flight. The ground color of these translucent wings was a finely mottled yellow and brown, while painted on the pleated surface were two eye-spots like those upon the feathers of a Peacock-pheasant, a dark velvety shaded portion with a delicately shaded ocellus at one edge.

The last insect captured was a tree-hopper as big as a cicada, mottled and marbled on the fore-wings, and stained scarlet on the hinder.

In Appendix C, pages 397, 398, I have added a list of a few of the moths and Orthoptera collected on the dining table at Hoorie, which have been identified.