ged the dugouts up the bank from the water
with block and tackle, with strain of rope and muscle. Then they
joined forces, as over the uneven ground it needed the united strength
of all their men to get the heavy dugouts along. Meanwhile the colonel
with one attendant measured the distance, and then went on a long
hunt, but saw no game. I strolled down beside the river for a couple
of miles, but also saw nothing. In the dense tropical forest of the
Amazonian basin hunting is very difficult, especially for men who are
trying to pass through the country as rapidly as possible. On such a
trip as ours getting game is largely a matter of chance.

On the following day Lyra and Kermit brought down the canoes and
loads, with hard labor, to the little beach by the three palms where
our tents were pitched. Many pacovas grew round about. The men used
their immense leaves, some of which were twelve feet long and two and
a half feet broad, to roof the flimsy shelters under which they hung
their hammocks. I went into the woods, but in the tangle of vegetation
it would have been a mere hazard had I seen any big animal. Generally
the woods were silent and empty. Now and then little troops of birds
of many kinds passed--wood-hewers, ant-thrushes, tanagers,
flycatchers; as in the spring and fall similar troops of warblers,
chickadees, and nuthatches pass through our northern woods. On the
rocks and on the great trees by the river grew beautiful white and
lilac orchids, the sobralia, of sweet and delicate fragrance. For the
moment my own books seemed a trifle heavy, and perhaps I would have
found the day tedious if Kermit had not lent me the Oxford Book of
French Verse. Eustache Deschamp, Joachim du Bellay, Ronsard, the
delightful La Fontaine, the delightful but appalling Villon, Victor
Hugo's "Guitare," Madame Desbordes-Valmore's lines on the little girl
and her pillow, as dear little verses about a child as ever were
written--these and many others comforted me much, as I read them in
head-net and gauntlets, sitting on a log by an unknown river in the
Amazonian forest.

On the 10th we again embarked and made a kilometre and a half,
spending most of the time in getting past two more rapids. Near the
first of these we saw a small cayman, a jacare-tinga. At each set of
rapids the canoes were unloaded and the loads borne past on the
shoulders of the camaradas; three of the canoes were paddled down by a
couple of naked paddlers apiece; and