290 DOWN AN UNKNOWN RIVER [chap, ix 



Recently, in Guiana, a wilderness veteran, Andre, lost 

 two-thirds of his party by starvation. Genuine wilder- 

 ness exploration is as dangerous as warfare. The 

 conquest of wild nature demands the utmost vigour, 

 hardihood, and daring, and takes from the conquerors 

 a heavy toll of life and health. 



Lyra, Kermit, and Cherrie, with four of the men, 

 worked the canoes half-way down the canyon. Again 

 and again it was touch and go whether they could get 

 past a given point. At one spot the channel of the furious 

 torrent was only fifteen yards across. One canoe was 

 lost, so that of the seven with which we had started only 

 two were left. Cherrie laboured with the other men at 

 times, and also stood as guard over them, for, while 

 actually working, of course no one could carry a rifle. 

 Kermit's experience in bridge building was invaluable 

 in enabling him to do the rope work by which alone it 

 was possible to get the canoes down the canyon. He 

 and Lyra had now been in the water for days. Their 

 clothes were never dry. Their shoes were rotten. The 

 bruises on their feet and legs had become sores. On 

 their bodies some of the insect bites had become fester- 

 ing wounds, as indeed was the case with all of us. 

 Poisonous ants, biting flies, ticks, wasps, bees, were a 

 perpetual torment. However, no one had yet been 

 bitten by a venomous serpent, a scorpion, or a centiped, 

 although we had killed all of the three within camp 

 limits. 



Under such conditions whatever is evil in men's 

 natures comes to the front. On this day a strange and 

 terrible tragedy occurred. One of the camaradas, a man 

 of pure European blood, was the man named Julio, of 

 whom I have already spoken. He was a very powerful 

 feUow and had been importunately eager to come on 



