We stopped at the first native hut encountered, which was but a ten-minute walk from the settlement of Florencia. There was a clearing of considerable size; the greater part of it was overgrown with grass and weeds, but there were also fields of cane and plantains. The latter were the finest I have ever found in all South America--eighteen inches long and sweeter and better flavored than the best bananas. It was almost impossible to grow sugar-cane in any quantity; capibaras were abundant along the streams and made nightly inroads on the plantation, devastating large areas on each visit.
The great Amazonian forest extending on all sides was full of surprising sounds emanating from a fauna entirely new to us. For the first time we heard the clear, ringing whistle of the “false bell-bird” (_Lathria cinerea_). The penetrating _whoo-ee-whee-oo_ filled the woods with music as the birds called to one another, but the obscurely colored singers were hard to see among the dark branches. The song contains several low, _churring_ notes that are lost from a distance.
The abundance and variety of wild life was so great as to almost bewilder us and we worked day and night preparing the wealth of material that came into our hands. Working conditions were most unfavorable; it rained daily; sand-flies took away a great deal of the pleasure that each day brought in the form of new and interesting creatures, while mosquitoes and fleas insisted on gaining an entrance under the nets and making the nights disagreeable. Every member of the expedition suffered from malaria during our entire stay in the Caquetá region. Notwithstanding these handicaps, we lost not a single day, and the collections rapidly grew to record-breaking size.
It was, of course, necessary to depend to a certain extent upon native hunters. They were always carefully instructed as to the area they should visit and how to work it; from the results they obtained I could usually tell whether directions had been followed. One of these _cazadores_ was a lazy, thoroughly good-natured half-breed named _Abrán_. He came in daily with a tale of woe, recounting in detail the great distance he had covered, the hardships of such a long tramp through the jungle, and--bringing few specimens. I pretended to believe his stories, knowing full well all the while that he had really selected a comfortable spot a mile or so away and then settled down on a log for a quiet day of smoking and day-dreaming. When any animal came within sight he shot it. In this manner he secured many of the shy, ground-haunting species, such as rails, tinamou, and ant-birds that one seldom sees while moving about through the forest. This was exactly what I wanted. It is all but impossible to find a native hunter with patience enough to sit and wait for these things, so while _Abrán_ thought he was playing an easy game, he was in reality the most valuable _peon_ in the outfit. His brother _Moisés_ was of the opposite temperament; he walked many miles each day and considered it beneath his dignity to shoot anything but large, brilliantly colored birds, such as parrots, macaws, cotingas, and tanagers, or monkeys--in short, game worthy of a man’s efforts. The two brothers made an ideal combination.