1884] River Explorations 



my experience. Besides the usual abundance of 

 oranges and bananas, one looked down on a wealth 

 of cherimollas, albicartes,^ papayas, and sapodillas. 

 The last, a brown fruit like a little russet apple but 

 having one large seed, is to my thinking the most 

 delicious of all. 



Into the market in the early morning came from Crtuity 

 the back country a lone procession of burros loaded ^° . , 



• CTllTflClls 



with chickens, as well as with sheep and pigs tied 

 in pairs and slung saddle-wise, head downward, 

 over the backs of the donkeys — the pigs squealing 

 lustily, the sheep helpless and dumb. To the suf- 

 fering of animals and even to that of men, the 

 Spanish race seems everywhere callous. 



I had no time to go far into the interior of Cuba, 

 but the region immediately about Havana is very at- 

 tractive, with its white coral soil relieved by the 

 green of tropical foliage. 



In the summer of 1884, under instructions from Fish 

 Goode, I began a special series of further explora- /^"«^.°/ 

 tions of the fish fauna of the American rivers, carried „w 

 on at intervals during the next five years. These ^'^^'"^ 

 various expeditions, continued in other waters by 

 my colleagues and students, were in line with Baird's 

 theory of utility in science. Knowledge loses nothing 

 through acquiring human values, and research takes 

 on a certain dignity by serving at once intellectual 

 demands and human necessities. 



By 1890 I had personally visited every considerable 

 river basin in the United States. Later I extended 

 my studies to include much of Alaska, Mexico, and 



1 Avocado or "Alligator Pear," both these names being corruptions of 

 Albicarte. 



C 287 3 



