70 THROUGH THE BRAZILIAN WILDERNESS 



cattle and horses, or so add to the interest of the land- 

 scape. There is every reason why the good people of 

 South America should waken, as we of North America, very 

 late in the day, are beginning to waken, and as the peoples 

 of northern Europe — not southern Europe — have already 

 partially wakened, to the duty of preserving from impov- 

 erishment and extinction the wild life which is an asset of 

 such interest and value in our several lands; but the case 

 against civilized man in this matter is grewsomely heavy 

 anyhow, when the plain truth is told, and it is harmed by 

 exaggeration. 



After five or six hours' travelling through this country 

 of marsh and of palm forest we reached the ranch for which 

 we were heading. In the neighborhood stood giant fig- 

 trees, singly or in groups, with dense, dark-green foliage. 

 Ponds, overgrown with water-plants, lay about; wet 

 meadow, and drier pastureland, open or dotted with 

 palms and varied with tree jungle, stretched for many 

 miles on every hand. There are some thirty thousand 

 head of cattle on the ranch, besides herds of horses and 

 droves of swine, and a few flocks of sheep and goats. The 

 home buildings of the ranch stood in a quadrangle, sur- 

 rounded by a fence or low stockade. One end of the 

 quadrangle was formed by the ranch-house itself, one story 

 high, with whitewashed walls and red-tiled roof. Inside, 

 the rooms were bare, with clean, whitewashed walls and 

 palm-trunk rafters. There were solid wooden shutters on 

 the unglazed windows. We slept in hammocks or on cots, 

 and we feasted royally on delicious native Brazilian dishes. 

 On another side of the quadrangle stood another long, 

 low white building with a red-tiled roof; this held the 



