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The interior of the crumbling structure was a wilderness of rank grass and weeds, the elysium of reptiles, iguanas, centipedes, and ten thousand poisonous insects. On our left, opposite the falling church, was another ruin; but its vulgar features owned none of the green and mossy dignity of age, which gave a melancholy beauty to the former.
that is, in pursuit of and shooting at the iguanas, a large species of lizard, measuring from five to six feet long, which infest the rocks on the borders of the lake. Tired of firing without being obliged to show any skill, our chasseurs would re-embark in their pirogues and row in search of new amusement, this was, to shoot at the eagles that came hovering over their heads.
We then rode up to the camp, and found their dinner ready, consisting of two eggs of the brush turkey, roasted opossums, bandicoots, and iguanas. Good opossum cloaks, kangaroo nets, and dillis neatly worked of koorajong bark, were strewed about; there were also some spears, made of the Bricklow Acacia: all were forgotten in the suddenness of their retreat.
Now it is the home of the large red and orange-colored iguanas, of which a number were captured, both alive and dead. These islands proved, indeed, admirable collecting grounds, the more interesting from the peculiarity of their local fauna. OFF GUATEMALA, July 29. . . .Our visit to the Galapagos has been full of geological and zoological interest.
They were as large as those seen in the neighbourhood of Port Phillip, but much browner. The other birds, most common, will be found in an extract from the game book, given in a future page. We saw no animals, except some large iguanas. Investigator Road is sheltered to the northward by shoal water stretching across between Sweers and Bentinck islands.
Fresh meat had almost invariably affected us; but after a time our continued exposure to the air, the regularity of our movements, and constant state of exertion, rendered us more hardy, and sharpened our appetites. Iguanas, opossums, and birds of all kinds, had for some time past been most gladly consigned to our stewing-pot, neither good, bad, nor indifferent being rejected.
The roar of the fast-spreading fire, the thousands of kangaroos, opossums, rats, snakes, iguanas, and birds that dashed hither and thither, to the accompaniment of bewildering shouts from the men and shrill screeches from the women, who occasionally assisted, flitting hither and thither like eerie witches amidst the dense pall of black smoke all these made up a picture which is indelibly imprinted on my mind.
In the bed of the nullah there were numerous pools, both large and small, but all were rapidly drying up, and destroying the numerous fish they contained; for as this desiccation increased, and the pools became smaller, the fervid sun heated the little remaining water to such an overpowering extent, that the fish, half suffocated, turned on their backs and became an easy prey to the numerous green-and-brown-striped iguanas that eagerly thronged their brinks for food.
Notwithstanding this, when he heard that it was one of the largest sized iguanas ever seen, the professor started through the jungle after it. "We can't take it with us if we get it," Tom called after his friend. "We might take the skin," answered the professor. "I have a standing order for such things from one of the museums I represent. I'd like to get it. Then they are often eaten.
They all stay in their winter homes until Mayrah blows the winter away. Mayrah first blows up a thunderstorm. When the iguanas hear the thunder, they know the spring is not far off, so they begin making a passage to go out again, but they do not leave their winter home until the Curreequinquin, or butcher birds sing all day almost without ceasing "Goore, goore, goore, goore."
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