SOME SOUTH AMERICAN FISHES 145 



There is hardly any rainfall on the west coast, 

 and not a single river worthy of the name flows 

 from it into the Pacific ; consequently there are 

 no fresh-water fish. So to the mighty La Plata, 

 San Francisco, Tocantins, Amazon, and Orinoco, 

 with their innumerable tributaries, we must go 

 for South American fresh-water fish. 



Truly, these waterways are laid down on a 

 vast scale. At Fray Bentos the river Uruguay 

 is some ten and a half miles wide (half the 

 width of the Channel between Dover and Calais), 

 though the distance from Monte Video, at the 

 mouth of the Plata, is two hundred and forty 

 miles ! It is more like an inland sea or lake, 

 than a river, and the wind often lashes the sur- 

 face of the water (as seen in the picture) into 

 real waves. 



At the Fray Bentos ^ wharf, was lying an Italian 

 galliot, a broad-beamed sailing craft, drawing very 

 little water. She had discharged her cargo of 

 timber, so for a few days the captain had nothing 

 to attend to, and as he was an enthusiastic fisher- 

 man and could speak English well, I proposed 

 to him that we should make a fishing expedition 

 up and down the river and some of its tributaries. 

 He took to the idea ; so with a crew of three, 

 ' Liebig's Extract of Meat Co. 



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