150 UP THE RIVER OF TAPIRS [chap, v 



boat. Around it the dusky cook worked with philo- 

 sophic solemnity in rain and shine. Our attendants, 

 friendly souls with skins of every shade and hue, slept 

 most of the time, curled up among boxes, bundles, and 

 slabs of beef. An enormous land-turtle was tethered 

 toward the bow of the house-boat. When the men slept 

 too near it, it made futile efforts to scramble over them; 

 and in return now and then one of them gravely used it 

 for a seat. 



Slowly the throbbing engine drove the launch and its 

 unwieldy side-partner against the swift current. The 

 river had risen. We made about a mile and a half an 

 hour. Ahead of us the brown water street stretched in 

 curves between endless walls of dense tropical forest. It 

 was like passing through a gigantic greenhouse. Wawasa 

 and burity palms, cecropias, huge figs, feathery bamboos, 

 strange yellow-stemmed trees, low trees with enormous 

 leaves, tall trees with foliage as delicate as lace, trees 

 with buttressed trunks, trees with boles rising smooth 

 and straight to lofty heights, all woven together by a 

 tangle of vines, crowded down to the edge of the river. 

 Their drooping branches hung down to the water, 

 forming a screen through which it was impossible to 

 see the bank, and exceedingly difficult to penetrate to 

 the bank. Rarely one of them showed flowers — large 

 white blossoms, or small red or yellow blossoms. More 

 often the hlac flowers of the begonia-vine made large 

 patches of colour. Innumerable epiphytes covered the 

 limbs, and even grew on the roughened trunks. We 

 saw Httle bird life — a darter now and then, and king- 

 fishers flitting from perch to perch. At long intervals 

 we passed a ranch. At one the large, red-tiled, white- 

 washed house stood on a grassy slope behind mango- 

 trees. The wooden shutters were thrown back from the 



