Identifier: oursearchforwild00nile (find matches)
Title: Our search for a wilderness; an account of two ornithological expeditions to Venezuela and to British Guiana
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: Niles, Blair Beebe, William, 1877-1962
Subjects: Natural history Birds
Publisher: New York, H. Holt and company

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just as musical as ever. io8 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. With the cutting off of communication between Venezuelaand Trinidad, Captain Truxillos occupation was gone.The Josef a Jacinta no longer plied busily back and forthbetween Port of Spain and Maturin, driving a brisk trade inhammocks, groceries and hides; and so at last she passedfrom the possession of Captain Truxillo to that of some moreprosperous trader who could afford to wait for the reopeningof commerce. For a year our old Captain watched his little vessel guidedout of the harbor of Port of Spain, with a strange hand atthe helm, and a strange voice in command. Then one dayshe sailed away never to return — but to be run aground andlost on a desolate and lonely part of the Venezuelan coast. What became of her new Captain and crew we never heard.We knew only that the kt Josefa Jacinta was lost, and thatwe could never sail her again, except on dream canos in aphantom wilderness. PART II OUR SECOND SEARCHBRITISH GUIANA IO<)
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p. IJO CHAPTER IV.GEORGETOWN. ANOTHER year has slipped past and again we aresouthward bound, toward that Mecca —the tropics —which never ceases to call us. The time is the fifteenth ofFebruary,, 1909; the place, the Royal Dutch Mail Steamship Coppename. Nine days out from New York at three oclock in themorning we are roused suddenly from sleep by a gentleroaring in our ears. When we have gained partial conscious-ness we realize it is the basso-prof undo whisper of good Cap-tain ijaasnoot summoning us to the bridge. We ask noquestions for we have learned that the voice of the genialDutchman means something worth while, whether it israised in a thunderous roar of Hofmeister! or as now ingentler accents. Wrapped in flapping blankets, we climbthe steep ladder to the bridge, there to enjoy for half an houra most wonderful display of phosphorescence — even excellingthat often visible in the Bay of Fundy. The Captain in allhis world-wide sea-faring has never seen anything to equal it.

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