People of the lower class attribute peculiar powers to the sloth. They say that when one of the animals finds it necessary to descend to the ground it is unable to climb back to its lofty perch; but a friendly cloud is always hovering near by which envelops it and carries it back to any desired station in the tree-tops. In some localities they also attribute the wild call of the giant goatsucker to the sloth. The only time I heard the latter utter any sound was when a mother called to her young that was a few feet away; she gave a fairly loud ‘peep’ and her offspring at once went to her. After a time our work at Squirrel Woods was completed, so, much to the relief of the inhospitable couple, we left the place and returned to Salento, where we had better fortune and were well cared for by one Colonel Martinez; his wife had come from Bogotá, was a well-educated woman, and, what interested us more just then, was a splendid cook. The family conducted a fairly good _posada_ and shop and had various other business interests, including several worthless mining claims along streams flowing into the Quindio River just below. A few excavations had been made into the hillsides; the largest was known as _La Mina del Gallo_ and had yielded hundreds of tons of rocks and earth; but as not a speck of the elusive yellow metal they so eagerly sought had been forthcoming, the mine had been abandoned, and owls and bats inhabited the dark tunnel. The greater part of the mining population had deserted Salento for a place about ten miles distant, where extensive cinnabar-fields had been discovered. They expected to acquire fabulous riches extracting the mercury from the deposits. Some Englishmen headed by a man named Lloyd-Owen were also interested in the enterprise, but I learned later that the prospect failed. At dusk we occasionally had a brief view of the Nevado del Tolima far to the east. The snow-capped summit is over eighteen thousand feet high, but we could never see more than a small portion of it on account of the ridges that surrounded it. At night the snowy dome gleamed white and frosty beneath a brilliant moon, and chill winds blew from the frigid heights and roared through the town. The paramos of Ruiz and Isabel, composed of high, cold valleys, plateaus, and snow-covered peaks are south of the Tolima. We straightway resolved to visit that region, and as the rainy season with its severe electrical storms was fast approaching, no time was lost in starting on the expedition. My experience on the Cerro Munchique was still too fresh to make me want to duplicate it or expose any other members of the party to a similar ordeal.