178 THE HIGHLAND WILDERNESS [chap vi 



named after him — and the Colonel, acting for the 

 Brazilian Government, has estabUshed a telegraph 

 station in what was once the palace of the Captain- 

 General. 



Our northward trail led along the high ground a 

 league or two to the east of the northward-flowing Rio 

 Sacre. Each night we camped on one of the small tribu- 

 tary brooks that fed it. Fiala, Kermit, and I, occupied 

 one tent. In the daytime the " pium " flies, vicious Uttle 

 sand- flies, became bad enough to make us finally use 

 gloves and head-nets. There were many heavy rains, 

 which made the travelling hard for the mules. The soil 

 was more often clay than sand, and it was slippery when 

 wet. The weather was overcast, and there was usually 

 no oppressive heat even at noon. At intervals along 

 the trail we came on the staring skuU and bleached 

 skeleton of a mule or ox. Day after day we rode for- 

 ward acroifs endless flats of grass and of low open 

 scrubby forest, the trees standing far apart and in most 

 places being but little higher than the head of a horse- 

 man. Some of them carried blossoms, white, orange, 

 yellow, pink ; and there were many flowers, the most 

 beautiful being the morning-glories. Among the trees 

 were bastard rubber-trees, and dwarf palmetto ; if the 

 latter grew more than a few feet high their tops were 

 torn and dishevelled by the wind. There was very 

 httle bird or mammal life ; there were few long vistas, 

 for in most places it was not possible to see far among 

 the grey, gnarled trunks of the wind-beaten Uttle trees. 

 Yet the desolate landscape had a certain charm of its 

 own, although not a charm that would be felt by any man 

 who does not take pleasure in mere space, and freedom 

 and vdldness, and in plains standing empty to the sun, 

 the wind, and the rain. The country bore some 



