56 A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 



She had a troop of thirty-one pack-mules, laden with all 

 conceivable baggage, besides provisions of every sort, fowls, 

 hams, c., and a train of twenty-five servants. Their hos- 

 pitality is said to be unbounded ; you have only to present 

 yourself at their gates at the end of a day's journey, and 

 if you have the air of a respectable traveller, you are sure 

 of a hearty welcome, shelter and food. The card of a 

 friend or a note of introduction insures you all the house 

 can afford for as long as you like to stay. 



The last three miles of our journey was over what is 

 called the " temporary road," the use of which will be 

 discontinued as soon as the great tunnel is completed. 

 I must say, that to the inexperienced this road looks ex- 

 ceedingly perilous, especially that part of it which is 

 carried over a wooden bridge 65 feet high, with a very 

 strong curvature and a gradient of 4 per cent (211 feet 

 per mile). As you feel the engine laboring up the steep 

 ascent, and, looking out, find yourself on the edge of a 

 precipitous bank, and almost face to face with the hindmost 

 car, while the train bends around the curve, it is difficult 

 to resist the sense of insecurity. It is certainly greatly 

 to the credit of the management of the line that no 

 accident has occurred under circumstances where the least 

 carelessness would be fatal.* 



It gives one an idea of the labor expended on this 

 railroad, to learn that for the great tunnel alone, now 

 almost completed (one of fourteen), a corps of some three 



* Some weeks after this I chanced to ask a beautiful young Brazilian 

 woman, recently married, whether she had ever been over this temporary 

 road for the sake of seeing the picturesque scenery. "No," she answered 

 with perfect seriousness, " I am young and very happy, and I do not wish 

 to die yet." It was an amusing comment on the Brazilian estimate of the 

 dangers attending the journey. 



