ACROSS UNKNOWN SOUTH AMERICA 
was my surprise to see the canoe shoot out of the water 
in a vertical position at the end of the rapid and waterfall! 
That was the greatest piece of luck I had on that journey. 
By being flung out of the water with such force she 
naturally emptied herself of all the water she contained, 
and I next saw her floating, going round and round the 
whirlpool at the bottom of the rapid. 
The next problem was how to recover the canoe, as 
she happened to be on the opposite side of the stream. 
There for more than two hours we watched her going 
round and round, while we sat on the rocks, absolutely 
speechless. Eventually we saw her gradually come out of 
the whirlpool and drift slowly into the recanto or back¬ 
water on the opposite shore some 400 metres away. 
My men were perplexed. They now said they would 
all leave me at once and proceed on foot. Under no cir¬ 
cumstances whatever would they accompany me any more. 
They must have their pay and go. 
So after a few minutes I paid the salaries of all the 
men, excepting the man X. To my surprise the men, 
instead of going, remained seated a little way off. 
I had a plan in my head of swimming across the river 
below the whirlpool, where the water was placid although 
of great width, but I could not very well place myself 
in such an awkward position as to leave on the river bank 
the large sums of money which I carried on my person. 
I certainly could not swim across such a long distance, 
and in such a current, with the heavy bags of coin and 
bank-notes round my waist. I feared -— in fact, felt 
certain — that in the mood in which my men were that 
day, the moment I entered the water and was quite 
helpless they would fire at me and get away with every¬ 
thing I possessed. I knew that they would never dare to 
do it unless they could catch me in a helpless condition. 
I called Antonio, who was an excellent swimmer, and 
said that I offered a reward of <£10 to any men who swam 
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