Ugh! how dismal!" I pushed on, climbing over fallen trunks, and twining myself through the viny cordage.

The creepers clung to my neck--thorns penetrated my skin--the _mezquite_ slapped me in the face, drawing blood.

I laid my hand upon a pendent limb; a clammy object struggled under my touch, with a terrified yet spiteful violence, and, freeing itself, sprang over my shoulder, and scampered off among the fallen leaves.

I felt its fetid breath as the cold scales brushed against my cheek.

It was the hideous iguana.
A huge bat flapped its sail-like wings in my face, and returned again and again, breathing a mephitic odour that caused me to gasp.