PROSPECTIVE DISCOMFORT 
clean it all up again. I saved the negatives which were 
in the damaged camera by developing them at once during 
the night, while they were still wet. 
My men were greatly excited over the accident, es¬ 
pecially the two who had fallen into the water. In a way 
I was glad it had happened, as I was in hopes it might be 
a good lesson to them and make them a little more care¬ 
ful in the future. Had Alcides obeyed my orders we 
should have gone through safely. I pointed that out to 
him, but it was useless; even then he maintained that in 
order to be safe you must steer right into the whirlpool 
and not out of it, which really made me begin to feel 
rather nervous, as I fully expected, as we went along, to 
find worse rapids than those we had negotiated so far, 
since we still had to get down from 1,000 feet or so to 
the sea level. 
We halted for the remainder of the day. I spent a 
miserable night sleeping on the packing-boxes, now that 
my bed had gone for ever. I did not deserve that bit 
of ill-luck, for indeed my camp-bed was the only thing I 
possessed which gave me a little comfort. After working 
hard all day and the greater part of the night, a few hours 
spent lying down flat on the stretched canvas of the bed 
were most enjoyable; although never, throughout the 
entire journey, was I able to sleep soundly, as I always 
had to be on the alert, never knowing what might 
happen. 
The night of July twenty-third was fairly cool, the 
minimum temperature being 58° Fahrenheit. When we 
proceeded on our journey in the morning we passed an 
island 1,500 metres long, Arabella Island. The river was 
now flowing due west. Again, we came upon rocks in the 
centre and upon the right side of the river, with a strong 
corrideira and with dangerous submerged rocks close to 
the surface. There was an islet 150 metres long on the 
right side in a basin 500 metres broad. A hill 100 feet 
121 
