Amongst the various specimens6 of the numerous family of the quadrumana ought to be recognized the little marikina; the sagouin, with its parti-coloured face; the grey mora, the skin of which is used by the Indians for covering their gun-locks; the sapajou, with its singular tuft over the forehead, and, most remarkable7 of all, the guariba (Simia Beelzebul) with its prehensile8 tail and diabolical9 countenance10.
At the first streak11 of daylight the senior member, as choragus, will start the key-note in a sonorous12 barytone, the younger monkeys join in tenor13 and alto, and the concert begins. But this morning there was no concert at all. There was nothing of the wonted serenade to break the silence of the forest. The shrill14 notes resulting from the rapid vibration15 of the hyoid bones of the throat were not to be heard. Indians would have been disappointed and perplexed17; they are very fond of the flesh of the guariba when smoked and dried, and they would certainly have missed the chant of the monkey "paternosters;" but Dick Sands and his companions were unfamiliar18 with any of these things, and accordingly the singular quietude was to them a matter of no surprise.
They all awoke much refreshed by their night's rest, which there had been nothing to disturb. Jack19 was by no means the latest in opening his eyes, and his first words were addressed to Hercules, asking him whether he had caught a wolf with his teeth. Hercules had to acknowledge that he had tasted nothing all night, and declared himself quite ready for breakfast. The whole party were unanimous in this respect, and after a brief morning prayer, breakfast was expeditiously20 served by old Nan. The meal was but a repetition of the last evening's supper, but with their appetites sharpened by the fresh forest air, and anxious to fortify21 themselves for a good day's march, they did not fail to do ample justice to their simple fare. Even Cousin Benedict, for once in his life at least, partook of his food as if it were not utterly22 a matter of indifference23 to him; but he grumbled24 very much at the restraint to which he considered himself subjected; he could not see the good of coming to such a country as this, if he were to be obliged to walk about with his hands in his pockets; and he protested that if Hercules did not leave him alone and permit him to catch fire-flies, there would be a bone to pick between them. Hercules did not look very much alarmed at the threat. Mrs. Weldon, however, took him aside, and telling him that she did not wish to deprive the enthusiast25 entirely26 of his favourite occupation, instructed him to allow her cousin as much liberty as possible, provided he did not lose sight of him.
The morning meal was over, and it was only seven o'clock when the travellers were once more on their way towards the east, preserving the same marching-order as on the day before.
The path was still through luxuriant forest. The vegetable kingdom reigned27 supreme28. As the plateau was immediately adjacent to tropical latitudes29, the sun's rays during the summer months descended30 perpendicularly31 upon the virgin32 soil, and the vast amount of heat thus obtained combined with the abundant moisture retained in the subsoil, caused vegetation to assume a character which was truly magnificent.
Dick Sands could not overcome a certain sense of mystification. Here they were, as Harris told them, in the region of the pampas, a word which he knew in the Quichna dialect signifies "a plain;" but he had always read that these plains were characterized by a deficiency alike of water, of trees, and rocks; he had always understood that during the rainy season, thistles spring up in great abundance and grow until they form thickets34 that are well-nigh impenetrable; he had imagined that the few dwarf35 trees and prickly shrubs36 that exist during the summer only stamp the general scene with an aspect of yet more thorough bareness and desolation. But how different was everything to all this! The forest never ceased to stretch away interminably to the horizon. There were no tokens of the rough nakedness that he had expected. Dick seemed to be driven to the conclusion that Harris was right in describing this plateau of Atacama, which he had for his part most firmly believed to be a vast desert between the Andes and the Pacific, as a region that was quite exceptional in its natural features.
It was not in Dick's character to keep his reflections to himself. In the course of the morning he expressed his extreme surprise at finding the pampas answer so little to his preconceived ideas.
"Have I not understood correctly," he said, "that the pampas is similar to the North American savannahs, only less marshy37?"
Harris replied that such was indeed a correct description of the pampas of Rio Colorado, and the Ilanos of Venezuela and the Orinoco.
"But," he continued, "I own I am as much astonished as yourself at the character of this region; I have never crossed the plateau before, and I must confess it is altogether different to what you find beyond the Andes towards the Atlantic."
"You don't mean that we are going to cross the Andes?" said Dick, in sudden alarm.
Harris smiled.
"No, no, indeed. With our limited means of transport such an undertaking38 would have been rash in the extreme. We had better have kept to the coast for ever rather than incur39 such a risk. Our destination, San Felice, is on this side of the range, and in order to reach it, we shall not have to leave the plateau, of which the greatest elevation40 is but little over 1500 feet."
"And you say," Dick persisted, "that you have really no fear of losing your way in a forest such as this, a forest into which you have never set foot before?"
"No fear whatever," Harris answered; "so accustomed am I to travelling of this kind, that I can steer41 my way by a thousand signs revealing themselves in the growth of the trees, and in the composition of the soil, which would never present themselves to your notice. I assure you that I anticipate no difficulties."
This conversation was not heard by any of the rest of the party. Harris seemed to speak as frankly42 as he did fearlessly, and Dick felt that there might be, after all, no just grounds for any of his own misgivings43.
Five days passed by, and the 12th of April arrived without any special incident. Nine miles had been the average distance accomplished44 in a day; regular periods of rest had been taken, and, except that Jack's spirits had somewhat flagged, the fatigue45 did not seem to have interfered46 with the general good health of the travellers.
First disappointed of his India-rubber-tree, and then of his humming birds, Jack had inquired about the beautiful parrots which he had been led to expect he should see in this wonderful forest. Where were the bright green macaws? where were the gaudy47 aras with their bare white cheeks and pointed16 tails, which seem never to light upon the ground? and where, too, were all the brilliant parroquets, with their feathered faces, and indeed the whole variety of those forest chatterers of which the Indians affirm that they speak the language of nations long extinct?
It is true that there was no lack of the common grey parrots with crimson48 tails, but these were no novelty; Jack
[Illustration: "Don't Fire!"]
had seen plenty of them before, for owing to their reputation of being the most clever in mimickry of the Psittacidæ, they have been domesticated49 everywhere in both the Old and New worlds.
But Jack's dissatisfaction was nothing compared to Cousin Benedict's. In spite of being allowed to wander away from the rank, he had failed to discover a single insect which was worth the pursuit; not even a fire-fly danced at night; nature seemed to be mocking him, and his ill-humour increased accordingly.
In this way the journey was continued for four days longer, and on the 16th it was estimated that they must have travelled between eighty and ninety miles north-eastwards from the coast. Harris positively50 asserted that they could not be much more than twenty miles from San Felice, and that by pushing forwards they might expect in eight-and-forty hours to find themselves lodged51 in comfortable quarters.
But although they had thus succeeded in traversing this vast table-land, they had not seen one human inhabitant. Dick was more than ever perplexed, and it was a subject of bitter regret to him that they had not stranded52 upon some more frequented part of the shore, near some village or
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