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Taglagallo Remarcafkus Directory 01
Page 02
Nearly three hundred species of _Coleoptera_, or beetles, occupy similar positions. Almost any rotten log or stump when broken open discloses a half dozen or more "horn" or "bess beetles," _Passalus cornutus_ L., great, shining, clumsy, black fellows with a curved horn on the head. They are often utilized as horses by country children, the horn furnishing an inviting projection to which may be fastened, by a thread or cord, chips and pieces of bark to be dragged about by the strong and never lagging beast of burden. When tired of "playing horse" they can make of the insect an instrument of music; for, when held by the body, it emits a creaking, hissing noise, produced by rubbing the abdomen up and down against the inside of the hard, horny wing covers. This beetle passes its entire life in cavities in the rotten wood on which it feeds, and when it wishes a larger or more commodious home it has only to eat the more.
With such a mind, active as phosphorus, biting everything that came near into the form that suited it, how could Mrs. Cadwallader feel that the Miss Brookes and their matrimonial prospects were alien to her? especially as it had been the habit of years for her to scold Mr. Brooke with the friendliest frankness, and let him know in confidence that she thought him a poor creature. From the first arrival of the young ladies in Tipton she had prearranged Dorothea's marriage with Sir James, and if it had taken place would have been quite sure that it was her doing: that it should not take place after she had preconceived it, caused her an irritation which every thinker will sympathize with. She was the diplomatist of Tipton and Freshitt, and for anything to happen in spite of her was an offensive irregularity. As to freaks like this of Miss Brooke's, Mrs. Cadwallader had no patience with them, and now saw that her opinion of this girl had been infected with some of her husband's weak charitableness: those Methodistical whims, that air of being more religious than the rector and curate together, came from a deeper and more constitutional disease than she had been willing to believe.
It was cold, especially at night. Nearly all my instruments had been badly damaged in our many accidents in Brazil, and I was unable to replace them either in Para or Manaos. Owing, therefore, to the lack of self-registering thermometers, I could not keep an accurate daily record of the maximum and minimum temperatures. After leaving Camp 93, we went over a really fearful trail, my mules being all the time chest-deep in mud. It was extremely hard work for the animals to get along. As is well known to any traveller, all animals of a caravan when on a narrow path step in the footprints of their predecessors, so that on that trail they had sunk a long series of deep holes in the soft clay, which were constantly being filled by water sliding from the mountain-side. In that particular part the mud had highly caustic qualities, which burnt the skin and caused irritation each time you were splashed. The muleteers who were walking had their feet badly burnt by it, one man suffering agony from his blistered feet.
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