, for it is terribly hot and mosquito-bitten,
and you couldn't have suggested anything more delightful. But here we
are once more at our forest-home; and now for a magnificent cup of
coffee and a mandioca-cake."

"Not to mintion," added Barney, "a juicy steak of Igu Anny, an' a tender
chop o' Army Dillo."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

MARTIN AND BARNEY CONTINUE THEIR TRAVELS, AND SEE STRANGE THINGS--AMONG
OTHERS, THEY SEE LIVING JEWELS--THEY GO TO SEE A FESTA--THEY FIGHT AND
RUN AWAY.

Martin Rattler and Barney O'Flannagan soon after this began to entertain
a desire to travel further into the interior of Brazil, and behold with
their own eyes the wonders of which they had heard so much from their
kind and hospitable friend, the hermit. Martin was especially anxious
to see the great river Amazon, about which he entertained the most
romantic ideas,--as well he might, for there is not such another river
in the world for size, and for the many curious things connected with
its waters and its banks. Barney, too, was smitten with an intense
desire to visit the diamond mines, which he fancied must be the most
brilliant and beautiful sight in the whole world; and when Martin asked
him what sort of place he expected to see, he used to say that he
"pictur'd in his mind a great many deep and lofty caverns, windin' in
an' out an' round about, with the sides and the floors and the ceilin's
all of a blaze with glittering di'monds, an' top'zes, an' purls, an'
what not; with Naiggurs be the dozen picking them up in handfuls. An'
sure," he would add, "if we was wance there, we could fill our pockets
in no time, an' then, hooray for ould Ireland! an' live like Imperors
for ivermore."

"But you forget Barney, the account the hermit has given us of the
mines. He evidently does not think that much is to be made of them."

"Och! niver mind the hermit. There's always good luck attends Barney
O'Flannagan; an' sure if nobody wint for fear they would git nothing,
all the di'monds that iver came out o' the mines would be lyin' there
still; an' didn't he tell us there was wan got only a short time since,
worth I don't know how many thousand pounds? Arrah! if I don't go to
the Mines an' git one the size o' me head, I'll let ye rig me out with a
long tail, an' set me adrift in the woods for a blue-faced monkey."

It so happened that this was the time when the hermit was in the habit
of setting out on one of his trading trips; and when Marti