e.

The whole of the upper valley was very lovely, and the air, from its
being so high up among the mountains, deliciously cool.

"It seems a pity," my uncle said, "that nobody lives here." For as far
as we could make out in our many journeys, human beings had never
penetrated its solitudes.

"Yes," I said, on one of these occasions, "it is a glorious place,
uncle, and anyone might make it a lovely garden with hardly any trouble;
but I shouldn't like to live here after all."

"Why?" he said. "You seem very hard to please."

"The place isn't perfect, uncle," I said.

"No place is, but I don't see much to find fault with. Oh, you mean
that we can find no quetzals."

"No, I did not," I said. "I meant we find too many rattlesnakes."

"Ah, yes, they are a nuisance, Nat; but they always get out of our way
if they can, and so long as they don't bite us we need not complain.
Well, we have pretty well explored this valley, and it is time we tried
another. We must get farther to the south."

"Why not strike off, then, from the top of the great cliff above the
arch, and try and find where the stream dives down?"

"What!" he said; "you don't think, then, that the stream rises entirely
there?"

"No," I said; "I fancy it dives underground when it reaches a mountain,
and comes out where we saw."

"Quite likely," he said, jumping at the idea. "We'll try, for we have
had some beautiful specimens from the woodlands on the banks of that
stream. Perhaps we may find my golden-green trogons up there after all,
for I feel sure that there are some to be found up among the head-waters
of the river."

The next day preparations were made for our expedition, and as the
country we were in seemed to be so completely uninhabited from its
unsuitability for agricultural purposes, and the little attraction it
had for hunters other than such as we, there was no occasion to mind
leaving the boat.

The carpenter and Pete were in high glee at the news that they were to
accompany us, and in the intervals of packing up, their delight was
expressed by furtive punches and slaps delivered when one or the other
was not looking.

"I am glad, Mr Nat," Bill Cross said to me when we were alone for a few
minutes overnight. "I'm not grumbling, sir, and I like making cases and
cooking and washing, but I do feel sometimes as if I'd give anything to
be able to shoulder a gun and come along with you gents, shooting and
hunting for curiosities."