CHAPTER VI 
The Tapir us Americanus — Striking Scenery — The Mate Tree — 
Photography in Camp — Brazilian Way of Reasoning — A New 
Christopher Columbus — The Selection of our Camps — Beauti¬ 
ful Fruit — A Large Tributary 
W E were still at an elevation of 1100 feet. The water 
was almost stagnant, and was evidently being 
held up by some obstacle. I feared that we should 
soon encounter nasty rapids. Watching the sky, I was 
generally able to foretell what was ahead of us in the 
river. In fact, a pretty mackerel sky, particularly to the 
northwest, showed me that the water of our river must 
be breaking up considerably, either in rapids or water¬ 
falls, in order to produce sufficient moisture in the air to 
cause the accumulation of those cloudlets. I always 
noticed that wherever there were heavy rapids farther 
down, clouds of more or less magnitude formed directly 
above them at a comparatively low elevation and remained 
there, owing to the perfect stillness of the air. 
On the night of July fourteenth the cold was felt 
intensely by my men, the thermometer actually showing 
a minimum of 38° Fahrenheit. 
During the night my men had a great excitement; for 
a large pachyderm, an ant a (Tapirus Americanus) in¬ 
quisitively came in the midst of our camp. It was 
evidently as much astonished at seeing us as we were in 
discovering its presence. My men had been firing their 
cartridges away during the day at rocks, at fish in the 
river, and so on, so that when their rifles were really 
needed the magazines were all empty, and thus gave the 
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