It
was not probable that they would do as well during the remainder of
our trip, for we intended thenceforth to halt as little, and march as
steadily, as the country, the weather, and the condition of our means
of transportation permitted. I kept continually wishing that they had
more time in which to study the absorbingly interesting life-histories
of the beautiful and wonderful beasts and birds we were all the time
seeing. Every first-rate museum must still employ competent
collectors; but I think that a museum could now confer most lasting
benefit, and could do work of most permanent good, by sending out into
the immense wildernesses, where wild nature is at her best, trained
observers with the gift of recording what they have observed. Such men
should be collectors, for collecting is still necessary; but they
should also, and indeed primarily, be able themselves to see, and to
set vividly before the eyes of others, the full life-histories of the
creatures that dwell in the waste spaces of the world.
At this point both Cherrie and Miller collected a number of mammals
and birds which they had not previously obtained; whether any were new
to science could only be determined after the specimens reached the
American Museum. While making the round of his small mammal traps one
morning, Miller encountered an army of the formidable foraging ants.
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