and night. Above all, the volume of sound becomes no more
than a pianissimo melody; for the chorus of birds and insects dies
away little by little with the increase of heat. There is something
geometrical about this, something precise and fine in this working of
a natural law--a law from which no living being is immune, for at
length one unconsciously lies motionless, overcome by the warmth and
this illusion of silence.

The swaying of the hammock sets in motion a cool breeze, and lying at
full length, one is admitted at high noon to a new domain which has no
other portal but this. At this hour, the jungle shows few evidences of
life, not a chirp of bird or song of insect, and no rustling of leaves
in the heat which has descended so surely and so inevitably. But from
hidden places and cool shadows come broken sounds and whisperings,
which cover the gamut from insects to mammals and unite to make a
drowsy and contented murmuring--a musical undertone of amity and
goodwill. For pursuit and killing are at the lowest ebb, the stifling
heat being the flag of truce in the world-wide struggle for life and
food and mate--a struggle which halts for naught else, day or night.

Lying quietly, the confidence of every unconventional and adventurous
wanderer will include your couch, since courage is a natural virtue when
the spirit of friendliness is abroad in the land. I felt that I had
acquired merit that eventful day when a pair of hummingbirds--thimblefuls
of fluff with flaming breastplates and caps of gold--looked upon me with
such favor that they made the strands of my hamaca their boudoir. I was not
conscious of their designs upon me until I saw them whirring toward me, two
bright, swiftly moving atoms, glowing like tiny meteors, humming like a
very battalion of bees. They betook themselves to two chosen cords and,
close together, settled themselves with no further demands upon existence.
A hundred of them could have rested upon the pair of strands; even the
dragon-flies which dashed past had a wider spread of wing; but for these
two there were a myriad glistening featherlets to be oiled and arranged,
two pairs of slender wings to be whipped clean of every speck of dust, two
delicate, sharp bills to be wiped again and again and cleared of
microscopic drops of nectar. Then--like the great eagles roosting high
overhead in the clefts of the mountainside--these mites of birds must needs
tuck their heads beneath their wings for slee