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WOODWORTH: GEOLOGICAL EXPEDITION TO BRAZIL AND CHILE. 19 
August 20th— The night was cloudy with a little rain and con- 
sequently warmer than on the two previous nights. We found that 
we had gotten on to the road leading over the Serra do Espigao, the 
very route we meant to avoid because of the Bugres, but quickly 
resolved to keep on. After proceeding at a painfully slow pace with 
many uncertain turns through the forest we halted at a distance of 
not more than 3.2 kilometers for breakfast in a piece of open campo 
surrounded by the now dripping forest, our way having led over vales 
and ridges about 100 feet high and through tree-fern swamps. More 
native huts appeared at about 5 kilometers from last night’s camp. 
At about 6 kilometers from the camp we encountered a chert bed on 
a hill south of a hamlet. Under this bed, at a river crossing immedi- 
ately north, there outcrop green shales. We got into camp on the 
bank of a small stream the valley of which is excavated in a yellowish 
green shale. For an hour before reaching this camp, the flat sky-line 
of the Triassic escarpment could be seen ahead on the south. Some 
huts near camp were built of hewn boards and hand-made shingles, 
with the usual open windows. This place is Chaxim. There was a 
broken down cross and the remnants of a fence along side our camp, 
enclosing the burial place of some one killed by the Bugres. All 
travellers on this road we observed went armed, an example which we 
followed. 
August 21st.— We got off early from camp as the manuscript map 
in our possession indicated that we were now near the base of the trap 
escarpment and should make the pass over the Serra do Espigao 
before noon. ‘The road led over some low hills of greenish shale near 
the beginning of the ascent. Shortly before the climb began we came 
to a few houses south of Chaxim, at one of which, a store kept by a 
German, we found a bugreiro, or sort of special police, armed with a 
cavalry sword and a double-barreled horse-pistol, whose evident 
business it was to accompany parties over the pass. The ascent of 
this pass, only some 1,200 feet above our base at the store, was so steep 
as to oblige us to dismount, and was made in such a rush with all 
revolvers drawn, that geological observations were, despite the fre- 
quent exposure of ledges, neither advisable nor clearly made. 
As is usual with South American mule paths the way led up the 
steep spur in preference to following one of the adjacent creases of the 
slope, since by so doing the minimum of mud and water is encountered 
at all times of the year. The escarpment below the crowning trap 
sheet is mainly sandstone of a reddish tinge which succeeds the green 
shales at the base. The chert beds before mentioned apparently 
