Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Noise Increased As We Advanced, And The
Birds Were Scared By The Light Of The Torches Of Copal.
When this
noise ceased a few minutes around us, we heard at a distance the
plaintive cries of the birds roosting in other ramifications of the
cavern.
It seemed as if different groups answered each other
alternately.
The Indians enter the Cueva del Guacharo once a year, near
midsummer. They go armed with poles, with which they destroy the
greater part of the nests. At that season several thousand birds
are killed; and the old ones, as if to defend their brood, hover
over the heads of the Indians, uttering terrible cries. The young,*
(* Called Los pollos del Guacharo.) which fall to the ground, are
opened on the spot. Their peritoneum is found extremely loaded with
fat, and a layer of fat reaches from the abdomen to the anus,
forming a kind of cushion between the legs of the bird. This
quantity of fat in frugivorous animals, not exposed to the light,
and exerting very little muscular motion, reminds us of what has
been observed in the fattening of geese and oxen. It is well known
how greatly darkness and repose favour this process. The nocturnal
birds of Europe are lean, because, instead of feeding on fruits,
like the guacharo, they live on the scanty produce of their prey.
At the period commonly called, at Caripe, the oil harvest,* (* La
cosecha de la manteca.) the Indians build huts with palm-leaves,
near the entrance, and even in the porch of the cavern.
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