FROM ANCON TO THE ISLAND 



29 



drinking water. The clear water of the little 

 brooks looks good enough to the ordinary negro 

 to drink as it is. It is hard to make him realize 

 that unboiled drinking water is one of the greatest 

 dangers of the tropics to a white man, now that 

 yellow fever has gone. The tiny, invisible animals 

 with which it may swarm can cause the most 

 difficult and wearing diseases. 



Our own small dugout canoe, called a ''cayuca" 

 (Fig. 13) and chopped out by a Frijoles negro, was 

 brought along the wharf and we loaded carefully, 

 for it never balanced quite so well as less home- 



FiG. 13. The big cayuca 



made boats do. Across the Frijoles inlet two negro 

 girls swung out from the shore standing in another 

 cayuca; but we sat down cautiously and were 



