There, and on the borders and surface of the inland waters, in the marshes and creeks, besides the flamingos, scarlet curlew, and spoonbills, already mentioned, will be found greenish-brown curlews, sandpipers, rails, coots, gulls, pelicans, jabirus, nandapoas, crabiers, snipes, plovers, ducks, geese, cranes, and anhingas, most of them in vast abundance; some frequenting only the sea-coast, others only the interior, according to their different natures; all worthy the attention of the naturalist, all worthy of a place in the cabinet of the curious.
Should thy comprehensive genius not confine itself to birds alone, grand is the appearance of other objects all around. Thou art in a land rich in botany and mineralogy, rich in zoology and entomology. Animation will glow in thy looks, and exercise will brace thy frame in vigour. The very time of thy absence from the tables of heterogeneous luxury will be profitable to thy stomach, perhaps already sorely drenched with Londo-Parisian sauces, and a new stock of health will bring thee an appetite to relish the wholesome food of the chase; never-failing sleep will wait on thee at the time she comes to soothe the rest of animated nature; and, ere the sun’s rays appear in the horizon, thou wilt spring from thy hammock fresh as April lark. Be convinced, also, that the dangers and difficulties which are generally supposed to accompany the traveller in his journey through distant regions, are not half so numerous or dreadful as they are commonly thought to be.
The youth who incautiously reels into the lobby of Drury Lane, after leaving the table sacred to the god of wine, is exposed to more certain ruin, sickness, and decay than he who wanders a whole year in the wilds of Demerara. But this will never be believed; because the disasters arising from dissipation are so common and frequent in civilised life, that man becomes quite habituated to them; and sees daily victims sink into the tomb long before their time, without ever once taking alarm at the causes which precipitated them headlong into it.
But the dangers which a traveller exposes himself to in foreign parts are novel, out-of-the-way things to a man at home. The remotest apprehension of meeting a tremendous tiger, of being carried off by a flying dragon, or having his bones picked by a famished cannibal—oh, that makes him shudder. It sounds in his ears like the bursting of a bomb-shell. Thank Heaven, he is safe by his own fireside!