proceed from the efforts of a bird. You would take it to be the woodman,
with his axe, striking a sturdy blow, oft repeated. There are fourteen
species here, all beautiful, and the greater part of them have their
heads ornamented with a fine crest, movable at pleasure.

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 straye