154 A BOOK-LOVER'S HOLIDAYS 



communities ever had the chance to develop. 

 It would be difficult to find in any country more 

 charming and better-bred men than some of the 

 gentlemen, the great ranchmen and the political 

 and social leaders in city life, whose generous 

 hospitality made me their debtor. But the 

 ordinary folk, and especially the Caboclos, the 

 peasantry, although with many sterling quali- 

 ties, were of a type wholly different from any- 

 thing to be found either in Europe or in tem- 

 perate North America. 



The land is largely composed of the pantanals, 

 the flat, wide-stretching marshes through which 

 the Paraguay and its affluents wind. Where the 

 land is low it is covered with papyrus and 

 water-grass; if a few feet higher, with open 

 palm forest. It offers fine pasturage for the 

 herds of cattle. In addition there are moun- 

 tains and belts of tropic jungle and forest, and 

 to the north rises the sandy central table-land 

 of Brazil. There are no railroads, and no high- 

 roads of any length for wheeled vehicles. The 

 rivers are the highways. Native boats, with 

 palm-thatch houses and cooking-ovens of red 

 earth on the decks, drift down them and are 

 poled or towed up them. A few light-draft 

 steamers, running every week or fortnight, 

 connect the widely scattered little cities. They 



