INCREASING DIFFICULTIES 297 



The men were growing constantly weaker under the 

 endless strain of exhausting labour. Kermit was having 

 an attack of fever, and Lyra and Cherrie had touches of 

 dysentery, but all three continued to work. While in 

 the water trying to help with an upset canoe I had, by 

 my own clumsiness, bruised my leg against a boulder ; 

 and the resulting inflammation was somewhat bother- 

 some. I now had a sharp attack" of fever, but, thanks 

 to the excellent care of the doctor, was over it in about 

 forty-eight hours ; but Kermit's fever grew worse, and 

 he too was unable to work for a day or two. We could 

 walk over the portages, however. A good doctor is an 

 absolute necessity on an exploring expedition in such 

 a country as that we were in, under penalty of a fright- 

 ful mortality among the members ; and the necessary 

 risks and hazards are so great, the chances of disaster so 

 large, that there is no warrant for increasing them by 

 the failure to take all feasible precautions. 



The next day we made another long portage round 

 some rapids, and camped at night stiU in the hot, wet, 

 sunless atmosphere of the gorge. The following day, 

 April 6, we portaged past another set of rapids, which 

 proved to be the last of the rapids of the chasm. For 

 some kilometres we kept passing hills, and feared lest at 

 any moment we might again find ourselves fronting 

 another mountain gorge, with, in such case, further 

 days of grinding and perilous labour ahead of us, 

 while our men were disheartened, weak, and sick. 

 Most of them had already begun to have fever. Their 

 condition was inevitable after over a month's uninter- 

 rupted work of the hardest kind in getting through the 

 long series of rapids we had just passed ; and a long 

 further delay, accompanied by wearing labour, would 

 have almost certainly meant that the weakest among 



