Late in the afternoon we reached a lone hut in a small clearing--the hastily erected shelter of a group of _peons_. The men invited us to stop, and as the locality looked interesting we accepted the invitation; but we erected our tent and lived in it in preference to the hut. All the surrounding country was covered with virgin forest. It had never been trodden by man, at least not within many years; there were no side trails of any kind, so that it was impossible to penetrate very far. Among our first mammals were a doe and fawn of a little forest-deer (_Mazama setta_). They are commonly known as brockets or spike-bucks, as each horn consists of a single prong. I believe that these deer are not so rare as generally supposed, but they are seldom collected on account of the difficulty of hunting them in the thick jungle. The _peons_ shot the ones we secured. They had discovered a path leading to a small stream, and concealing themselves on the opposite side, waited until the animals came down to drink; then they shot them. The men also brought in a huge bushmaster that they unearthed while clearing away underbrush. The deadly reptile is known as _equis_ to the natives on account of the black X-shaped marks on its back. The mountainsides were scarred with deep fissures and ravines filled with the darkest and most impenetrable of forests. It was possible to look across from one side to the other, but crossing them was impracticable. Each morning I could see a flock of some thirty-odd swallow-tailed kites soaring just above the trees on the far side of one of the ravines. The magnificent birds resembled huge white-bellied swallows, or swifts, as they circled majestically over the dark forest; they uttered shrill screams all the while. Apparently they fed on the wing, and specimens collected by us later had eaten quantities of large beetles and flying ants. At about nine o’clock the band always resorted to the top of a tall tree that towered far above its contemporaries for a short rest; this was rather unusual, as the birds are rarely seen perched, and the natives said they never alight during the daytime. Live birds, or specimens freshly killed, have the glistening black back covered with a beautiful grayish “bloom” or powder that gives it a soft, velvety appearance. However, this disappears soon after death. A species of pigmy squirrel (_Microsciurus_) lived in the forest, but we seldom saw any of the little creatures scarcely bigger than one of the larger kinds of mice. I have always found these animals much rarer than the ordinary squirrels; usually they live in pairs. They seem to prefer forests abounding in palms and to feed on the various kinds of palm-fruits and nuts. They frequently evince a great deal of curiosity and can be approached to within a short distance before taking fright and scampering out of sight among the leaves.