host of gorgeous Y/ildflowers decked our path. On the lower reaches, exc^uisite 
rrjagenta fuchsia trees held oat their pendant buds, while pearly- white begonia 
flowers gleamed ever^nvhere. Purple ciuaresm trees, with floY/ers shaped like 
dogwood blossoms, floated la^y petals down upon our pcith, v/Iiile bees worked 
busily in every chalice. On the higher levels, a rock garden of nature’s 
own design was blooming profusely everywhere. 
On our way up, we passed through the abandoned works of the gold silnes 
built by the Bandeirantes ii:ore than 200 pears ago, Inssive stone walls a 
yard thick reared themselves 50 feet from the lower slopes, and we walked 
along their tops, on and off the little path that paralleled them. Great 
stone doorv/aps that led to nothing frairxed ex:puisit bits of mountain and 
cloud across the valley. I wished I were an archeolog:ist with pick and 
shovel, to . dig around the old fallen lintels and perhaps un.earth rusted 
locks and keys, or ancient coins or even old mining tools lyirig: hidden in 
the earth. Tunnels led into the mountain on all sides, evidentlp^ of much 
later origin and verp^ poorly constructed, one or two of which we exolored 
v/ith no result 
x^nd still we climbed.’ 
V/e had passed the last church 
whose white spires now gleamed richlp^ in the copperjf sun of late afternoon. 
Below us in the vallep’- lap^ cx tea plantation, the red soil between the nicel3r 
cultivated rows of bushes imparting a patchwork- guilt effect to the regio 
N 
ow our negro guides led us to a rather steep decline, at the bottom of 
which a turbulent little stream shouted at its release as it hastened, down 
to the Valle Here w^e secured soire large black tadpoles of the frog called 
, but no adults, as thep" sleep in the daptime in s^xils of 
leaves where it is next to irapossibis to locate them. 
Our next stop v'?as hcilf-nfay down the moimtain at the old iinne I’uins, 
where there was a report of another hatcave. We stumbled down a rigantic 
