Gerald Durrell - THREE SINGLES TO ADVENTURE

I pondered for a long time on the apparently reckless behaviour of these birds but could think of no satisfactory explanation.

We left the flat, lush area of cultivation and walked suddenly into an astonishing landscape. Stunted, moss-tangled trees grew in little clumps, and around the trunks straggled a dusty and sparse-looking carpet of low growth. In between these little oases stretched great barren areas of sand, white and glittering like a new fall of snow.

The sand itself was fine and white, and it was mixed with millions of tiny mica chips that reflected the morning sun with the glittering brilliance of a landscape of diamonds. Some time before we had reached this strange white –wilderness Cordai had removed his shoes, and I now saw why: with his bare feet he flitted across the glinting sand as though he was wearing snowshoes, while Bob, Ivan, and I floundered behind, sinking up to our ankles and getting our shoes full of it.

These sand reefs or mouries, as they are called in Guiana are found in many localities. They are really the remains of an ancient sea-bed that once spread across the land. From a botanist's point of view they are of absorbing interest, for the shrubs and low growth that flourish on them are either peculiar to that type of country, and found nowhere else in Guiana, or else strange variations of the humid forest flora that have adapted themselves to live in that desiccated terrain. Some of the gnarled trees had great bunches of orchids spouting from the bark like pink waterfalls of flowers, and in this desert-like country they looked very bright and succulent, and completely out of place. Other trees were decorated with grey mud termites' nests among the branches, and from a hole in one of them a pair of tiny parrakeets flew out as we passed, and went wheezing and chittering through the trees. But the chief occupants of this mourie were hundreds of big amevas, who seemed to favour this white landscape, against which their bright colouring showed to advantage. They seemed tamer than the ones nearer Adventure and they would let us approach quite close before slithering slowly away. With such a meagre scattering of undergrowth I wondered how so many large and voracious lizards found enough insect food to keep themselves alive, but they all looked fat and heavy.

A Guianian sand reef may be of great botanical and zoological interest, but it is a most exhausting place to cross in a hurry. After we had travelled across two miles or so of sand, I found my interest waning considerably. I was extremely hot, and the intense, glittering surface was making my eyes ache.

Bob and Ivan seemed to be in a similar condition, but Cordai, irritatingly enough, seemed as fresh as when he started. We three staggered along behind him, casting black and brooding looks at his back. Then, as suddenly as we had entered it, we left the reef and found ourselves in the blessed shade of thick wood that bordered a wide and shallow canal. Cordai seemed willing to go on, but he was outvoted by three to one, and we lay down in the shade for a rest. As we lay there quietly, without talking, a flock of tiny birds arrived in the tangle of branches above us and flipped from twig to twig, cheeping excitedly. They were plump little things, with intelligent domed heads and large dark eyes. The top half of their bodies was a deep, shining Prussian blue, which looked black until the sun shone on its glossy surface, and the underparts were a rich yellow-orange. They hopped and fluttered through the leaves, carrying on their excited, tinkling conversation with one another and occasionally hanging head downwards to peer suspiciously at us. I nudged Bob and pointed out the birds to him.

"What are they? They look like something out of Walt Disney."

"Tanagra Violacea," I intoned sonorously.

"What?"

" Tanagra Violacea. That's what they're called."

Bob looked at me closely to see if I was joking.

"I can't understand why you zoologists insist on burdening creatures with such awful names," he said at last.

"In this particular case I agree that the name is not very suitable," I admitted, sitting up.

The Tanagra Violacea, alarmed to see that we were not, after all, part of the undergrowth, flew off twittering wildly.

Cordai insisted that the lake was not far away now and that another hour's walk would bring us to it. Bob, on hearing this, went and cut himself a large staff from the surrounding brushwood, in case we had to cross any more sand reefs. He was swishing it about in a most professional manner when he happened to hit a clump of undergrowth behind him, and immediately there arose a loud squeaking wail from amongst the leaves, which aroused us to immediate action. Cordai and Ivan executed a flanking movement on the clump of herbage, while Bob and I approached from the front. We parted the leaves and peered among the grass stalks, but there was nothing to be seen.

"I see it," said Bob suddenly.

"Where? What is it?"

Bob peered among the leaves.

"It's a rat," he said at length, in disgusted tones.

"What sort of rat?" I asked, a suspicion forming in my mind.

"Oh, just an ordinary sort of rat."

"Let's have a look," I said, moving round to his vantage point. I looked through the branches, and there, squatting under some leaves, was a large rusty-brown rat with a pale cream-coloured belly. As I caught sight of it the rat gave another one of its squeaking wails and rushed off through the undergrowth.

"Quick, Bob!" I yelped frenziedly."It's a soldier rat. It's coming towards you! For heaven's sake get it!"

I was especially excited because soldier rats have always seemed to me peculiarly fascinating. Up to that moment I knew the species only from skins I had seen in various museums. I had described it hopefully to every hunter I had met in Guiana , but none of them had known it, and I had resigned myself to going without a live specimen. Yet here was a real soldier rat rushing through the grass in the direction of Bob's legs. He paused only to say 'soldier rat?’ in a bewildered tone of voice, and then flung himself nobly on top of the flying beast.

"Don't lie on it," I pleaded agitatedly."You'll kill it."

"How else do you expect me to catch it?" asked Bob irritably.

"I've got it underneath me; you come and get it out."

He lay flat on his face among the bushes and gave us a testy running commentary on the rat's movements, while we surrounded him with nets and bags.

"It's wriggling down towards my leg … no, it's coming back again. Now it's stopped under my chest. Do hurry up, can't you? It's working its way up towards my chin. I wish you'd hurry up. I can't lie here all day. Do these wretched animals bite, by the way?"

"It won't be in any condition to bite after you've been rolling about on top of it," I said, with visions of my first soldier rat looking as though it had been flattened by a steamroller.

A curious expression came over Bob's face.

"I believe there are two of them. I could have sworn it was up by my chest, but now I can feel it down by my leg."

"Imagination," I said, crouching down beside him.

"Now, which leg's it under?"

"My left one."

I pushed my hand carefully under his thigh, until I felt the warm, furry body of the rat. Very carefully, so as not to get bitten, I clasped it in my hands and pulled it out. It lay limp in my hand, offering no resistance; and for a moment I thought it was hurt. I examined it carefully, but it seemed all right, so I placed it reverently in a cloth bag. Then I turned and found Bob still lying flat in the undergrowth.

"What's the matter?"

"When you've quite finished gloating over that creature," he said patiently, "would you have the goodness to remove this other one from under my chest? I'm afraid to move in case it bites me."