territory. Bolivia sent a detachment of troops to hold the disputed lands 

 and the young man who spoke to us was the surgeon of it. The expedi- 

 tion met no enemy, save the terrible enemy of the country itself, and not 

 a shot was fired, but a more dreadful tale of hardship and suffering 

 I never hstened to. The story was told in a quiet, matter-of-fact way 

 and one felt assured that there was no exaggeration, rather an under- 

 statement in the telling. The Bolivians were obliged to give up Acre 

 and surrender to the first Brazilians they could find. 



On September 6 arrived the news of President McKinley's assassina- 

 tion. I was at dinner in the hotel, when a newsboy came in with what 

 passed for extras in that town. It was a small sHp of paper, some six 

 inches by four, on one side of which was printed the cablegram, an- 

 nouncing the fact in three or four Hnes. So far as I can remember, 

 the crime caused no commotion in Argentina, but the polite German 

 teller in the bank where I kept my account took occasion to rail at 

 the murdered President and denounced him as an international danger. 

 Though I could not grieve for McKinley, I was apprehensive as to 

 the adventures into which the impulsive "Teddy" Roosevelt might lead 

 us. 



As the day of my departure for home drew nigh, I had another burst 

 of intense activity in winding up my various lines of work and packing 

 the spoils of birds, fossils and books, which I had acquired by purchase 

 and exchange. When these were boxed, they formed a large wagon 

 load. Of my photographic prints, I made up two large albums, one for 

 Ameghino, containing all the pictures I had made of his fossils, and 

 the other, for myself, in which I mounted all the photographs I had 

 taken in La Plata and Buenos Aires. This album I found to be of ines- 

 timable value in my work on the Santa Cruz mammals, especially as 

 Ameghino had, in the most generous fashion, given me permission to 

 publish reproductions of any of his material that I might need, a favour 

 of which I took Hberal advantage. I did not hke to rely upon a verbal 

 permission, since misunderstandings so easily arise over oral agree- 

 ments. I therefore wrote Ameghino a letter, asking if I had correctly 

 understood him to authorise me to publish figures of his fossils in my 

 forthcoming reports. To this letter I received a very cordial reply, in 

 which he repeated the permission so explicitly that no misunderstand- 

 ing would be possible. He even went further and offered to let me take 

 home with me, for description and illustration, a fine skull of a new 

 and undescribed species, an unusually generous offer. 



C 253 ] 



