narrow,
tortuous opening was left, through which the waters raced like a
mill-course, making a heavy draft on the intuitive skill of the
_bogas_. Often slender islets rose from the river; and then heated,
chattering, often acrimonious discussions ensued among the men as to
the proper channel to take. Always on either side rose the matted,
tangled, impenetrable forest wall of dense bush and giant trees, from
which innumerable trailers and _bejuco_ vines dropped into the waters
beneath. From the surface of the river to the tops of the great trees,
often two hundred feet above, hung a drapery of creeping plants, of
parasitical growths, and diversified foliage, of the most vivid shades
of green, inextricably laced and interwoven, and dotted here and there
with orchideous flowers and strange blossoms, while in the tempered
sunlight which sifted through it sported gorgeous insects and
butterflies of enormous size and exquisite shades, striped and spotted
in orange, blue, and vivid red. Scarcely a hand's breadth of the
jungle wall but contained some strange, eerie animal or vegetable form
that brought expressions of wonder and astonishment from the
enraptured Americans. At times, too, there were grim tragedies being
enacted before them. In one spot a huge, hairy spider, whose delicate,
lace-like web hung to the water's edge, was viciously wrapping its
silken thread about a tiny bird that had become entangled. Again, a
shriek from beyond the river's margin told of some careless monkey or
small animal that had fallen prey to a hungry jaguar. Above the
travelers all the day swung the ubiquitous buzzards, with their
watchful, speculative eyes ever on the slowly moving cavalcade.

Carmen sat enthralled. If her thought reverted at all to the priest,
she gave no hint of it. But once, leaning back and gazing off into
the opalescent sky overhead, she murmured: "And to think, it is only
the way the human mind translates God's ideas! How wonderful must they
be! And some day I shall see those ideas, instead of the mortal mind's
interpretations of them!"

Harris heard her, and asked her to repeat her comments in English. But
she refused. "You would not understand," she said simply. And no
badinage on his part could further influence her.

Rosendo, inscrutable and silent, showed plainly the weight of
responsibility which he felt. Only twice that day did he emerge from
the deep reserve into which he had retired; once when, in the far
di