2 THE START [chap, i 



Presidency he and I should go up the Paraguay into 

 the interior of South America. At the time I wished 

 to go to Africa, and so the subject was dropped ; but 

 from time to time afterward we talked it over. Five 

 years later, in the spring of 1913, I accepted invitations, 

 conveyed through the governments of Argentina and 

 Brazil, to address certain learned bodies in these countries. 

 Then it occurred to me that, instead of making the 

 conventional tourist trip purely by sea round South 

 America, after I had finished my lectures I would come 

 north through the middle of the continent into the 

 vaUey of the Amazon ; and I decided to write Father 

 Zahm and tell him my intentions. Before doing so, 

 however, I desired to see the authorities of the American 

 Museum of Natural History, in New York City, to find 

 out whether they cared to have me take a couple of 

 naturahsts with me into Brazil and make a collecting 

 trip for the museum. 



Accordingly, I wrote to Frank Chapman, the curator 

 of ornithology of the museum, and accepted his invita- 

 tion to lunch at the museum one day early in June. 

 At the lunch, in addition to various naturalists, to my 

 astonishment I also found Father Zahm ; and as soon 

 as I saw him I told him I was now intending to make 

 the South American trip. It appeared that he had 

 made up his mind that he would take it himself, and 

 had actually come on to see Mr. Chapman to find out if 

 the latter could recommend a naturalist to go with him ; 

 and he at once said he would accompany me. Chapman 

 was pleased when he found out that we intended to go 

 up the Paraguay and across into the valley of the 

 Amazon, because much of the ground over which we 

 were to pass had not been covered by collectors. He 

 saw Henry Fairfield Osborn, the president of the 



