i86 Through the Brazilian Wilderness 



At this camp the auto-vans again joined us. They 

 were to go direct to the first telegraph station, at the 

 great falls of the Utiarity, on the Rio Papagaio. Of 

 course they travelled faster than the mule-train. Father 

 Zahm, attended by Sigg, started for the falls in them. 

 Cherrie and Miller also went in them, because they had 

 found that it was very difficult to collect birds, and 

 especially mammals, when we were moving every day, 

 packing up early each morning and the mule-train arriv- 

 ing late in the afternoon or not until nightfall. More- 

 over, there was much rain, which made it difficult to work 

 except under the tents. Accordingly, the two naturalists 

 desired to get to a place where they could spend several 

 days and collect steadily, thereby doing more effective 

 work. The rest of us continued with the mule-train, as 

 was necessary. 



It was always a picturesque sight when camp was 

 broken, and again at nightfall when the laden mules 

 came stringing in and their burdens were thrown down, 

 while the tents were pitched and the fires lit. We break- 

 fasted before leaving camp, the aluminum cups and plates 

 being placed on ox-hides, round which we sat, on the 

 ground or on camp-stools. We fared well, on rice, beans, 

 and crackers, with canned corned beef, and salmon or 

 any game that had been shot, and coffee, tea, and matte. 

 I then usually sat down somewhere to write, and when 

 the mules were nearly ready I popped my writing- 

 materials into my duffel-bag — war-sack, as we would 

 have called it in the old days on the plains. I found 

 that the mules usually arrived so late in the afternoon 

 or evening that I could not depend upon being able to 



