The wings of bright birds flash before the eye, passing from tree to tree.

The gaudy tanagers, that cannot be tamed-- the noisy lories, the resplendent trogons, the toucans with their huge clumsy bills, and the tiny bee-birds (the _trochili_ and _colibri_)--all glance through the sunny vistas.
The carpenter-bird--the great woodpecker--hangs against the decayed trunk of some dead tree, beating the hollow bark, and now and then sounding his clarion note, which is heard to the distance of a mile.
Out of the underwood springs the crested curassow; or, basking in the sun-lit glades, with outspread wings gleaming with metallic lustre, may be seen the beautiful turkey of Honduras.
The graceful roe (_Gervus Mexicanus_) bounds forward, startled by the tread of the advancing horse.

The caiman crawls lazily along the bank, or hides his hideous body under the water of a sluggish stream, and the not less hideous form of the iguana, recognised by its serrated crest, is seen crawling up the tree-trunk or lying along the slope of a lliana.
The green lizard scuttles along the path--the basilisk looks with glistening eyes from the dark interstices of some corrugated vine--the biting peckotin glides among the dry leaves in pursuit of its insect prey--and the chameleon advances sluggishly along the branches, while it assumes their colour to deceive its victims.
Serpent forms present themselves: now and then the huge boa and the macaurel, twining the trees.

The great tiger-snake is seen with its head raised half a yard from the surface; the cascabel, too, coiled like a cable; and the coral-snake with his red and ringed body stretched at full length along the ground.

The two last, though inferior in size to the boas, are more to be dreaded; and my horse springs back when he sees the one glistening through the grass, or hears the "skir-r-r-r" of the other threatening to strike.
Quadrupeds and quadrumana appear.