Tropic Days | Page 9

others in excitable tones. When, perhaps, there are but a poor dozen or
so round the trough, you may chance to see the birds in attitudes more
varied than those of Pliny's doves, and catch the shadows of burnished
necks darkening the water, as in that famous mosaic, and even the
glistening reflection of the red, jewel-like eyes. Other birds, with far
less assurance and shrill clamour than the lovely starlings, visit the
trough regularly and by the score. Two species of honey-eaters are
seldom unrepresented. The barred-shouldered dove, the spangled
drongo, the noisy pitta, the red-crowned fruit pigeon, the
pheasant-tailed pigeon, are less frequent visitors; and though the
purple-breasted fruit pigeon--the most magnificent of all--talks to his
mate in coarse gutturals from the trees above, he has not been seen
actually drinking. So shy and furtive a bird would choose his time for
refreshment when there is little likelihood of interruption. In the ravine
there are often metallic starlings by the dozen, and little green
pigeons--for those domiciled come and go at all hours of the day.
Occasionally a sulphur-crested cockatoo comes sailing down to the
diminishing pool through interwoven leafage noiselessly as a butterfly;
but scrub fowls, scared by the apparition in white, scamper off with a
clatter, scattering the dead leaves. In such narrow quarters, birds are
under restraint, and show anxiety and apprehension. There is no sport
or play. They drink quickly and with faculties strained, and flutter off
excitedly on the least alarm. Well may they be suspicious, for is not the
cool spot attractive to the sly enemy, the green snake, which conceals

its presence by faithful resemblance to the creepers among which it
glides? Here, too, come millions of industrious bees, and in the dusk
the big pencil-tailed water-rat, which the masterful dog kills with as
little ceremony as he does the bird-scaring snakes.
It was late for cockatoos to start on their daily flight to the mainland
from the big tree close to the twin palms half-way up the hill, and as
they flew hastily and in close company they scolded each other in
unmannerly terms. The language must have been vexing, for as they
sped along far above the passionless sea one jostled the other. It was
just the sort of action to provoke hungry, peevish birds to
vindictiveness. That which had been jostled turned on the offender with
angry shrieking, and instantly a clamorous fight was in progress. Claws
became interlocked, and they fell each with distended crest, like a
gilt-edged cloudlet following the setting sun. Shadow and substance
met with a splash. The sea momentarily swallowed the combatants.
Then a yellow note of exclamation appeared, and with laboured
flutterings, using his enemy as a base, one rose and struggled to the
beach oaks. Frantic wing-beating showed that the other bird was in
serious difficulties. It was a hundred yards out, but the enjoyment of a
sunbath after a sea frolic enabled one to proceed to the rescue without
preliminaries. Half drowned and completely cowed, the bird was now
confronted by a more awful peril than that of the sea. A bedraggled
crest indicated horror at the steady approach of the enemy man, whose
presence stimulated the sodden bird to such extraordinary efforts that it
succeeded in rising and in making slow, low flight to the beach.
At dawn a bat flew into a spider's web spun during the night, the
extremities of the wings being so entangled that struggling was almost
impossible. A big spider pounced on it. Not a minute elapsed from the
entanglement until the bat was released, but the venom of the spider
had done its work. There was not a sign of life. The spider is dark grey
in colour, bloated of body, slothful, and of most retiring disposition.
Huddled up into almost spherical form, it lurks in dark places, which it
soon makes insanitary. In the open it crouches among dead leaves
which have gathered in the fork of a tree, and will construct a web
which spans the coconut avenue with its stays. From one aspect its
rotund body invites a good-humoured smile, for the marking exactly
simulates the features of a tabby cat, well fed, sleepy, and in placid

mood. Venom of virulence to kill a bat almost instantly would be
severe enough to a human being. This dirty, obese spider deserves little
consideration at the hand of man.
A moonless, cloudless night. The little praam takes the ground in the
bay a few yards from the beach, and in the midst of a constellation of
"jelly-fishes" spherical in form and varying in size. The larger are so
many pale blue orbs floating lazily in a luminous mist, the only visible
manifestation of life being a delicate but rhythmical deepening of the
central hue.