We had been out about three hours when one of the dogs gave tongue in a large belt of woodland and jungle to the left of our line of march through the marsh.  The other dogs ran to the sound, and after a while the long barking told that the thing, whatever it was, was at bay or else in some refuge.  We made our way toward the place on foot.  The dogs were baying excitedly at the mouth of a huge hollow log, and very short examination showed us that there were two peccaries within, doubtless a boar and sow.  However, just at this moment the peccaries bolted from an unsuspected opening at the other end of the log, dove into the tangle, and instantly disappeared with the hounds in full cry after them.  It was twenty minutes later before we again heard the pack baying.  With much difficulty, and by the incessant swinging of the machetes, we opened a trail through the network of vines and branches.  This time there was only one peccary, the boar.  He was at bay in a half-hollow stump.  The dogs were about his head, raving with excitement, and it was not possible to use the rifle; so I borrowed the spear of Dom Joao the younger, and killed the fierce little boar therewith.

This was an animal akin to our collared peccary, smaller and less fierce than its white-jawed kinsfolk.  It is a valiant and truculent little beast, nevertheless, and if given the chance will bite a piece the size of a teacup out of either man or dog.  It is found singly or in small parties, feeds on roots, fruits, grass, and delights to make its home in hollow logs.  If taken young it makes an affectionate and entertaining pet.  When the two were in the hollow log we heard them utter a kind of moaning, or menacing, grunt, long drawn.

An hour or two afterward we unexpectedly struck the fresh tracks of two jaguars and at once loosed the dogs, who tore off yelling, on the line of the scent.  Unfortunately, just at this moment the clouds burst and a deluge of rain drove in our faces.  So heavy was the downpour that the dogs lost the trail and we lost the dogs.  We found them again only owing to one of our caboclos; an Indian with a queer Mongolian face, and no brain at all that I could discover, apart from his special dealings with wild creatures, cattle, and horses.  He rode in a huddle of rags; but nothing escaped his eyes, and he rode anything anywhere.  The downpour continued so heavily that we knew the rodeo had been abandoned, and we turned our faces for the long, dripping, splashing ride homeward.  Through the gusts of driving rain we could hardly see the way.  Once the rain lightened, and half a mile away the sunshine gleamed through a rift in the leaden cloud-mass.  Suddenly in this rift of shimmering brightness there appeared a flock of beautiful white egrets.  With strong, graceful wing-beats the birds urged their flight, their plumage flashing in the sun.  They then crossed the rift and were swallowed in the gray gloom of the day.