ACROSS UNKNOWN SOUTH AMERICA 
everything and quantities of blood besides. I must have 
been unconscious many hours, after which I slept soundly 
till the sun was well up in the sky, when I found myself 
resting on the ground with a pool of blood by my side. 
Poor Filippe and Benedicto were also in a bad way. 
On the front of that hut on a piece of board was 
written “ El Paraiso ” (Paradise), the name of that place. 
It was not exactly my idea of Heaven. 
Our first meals were worse than no meals at all. W 
felt in such a plight that we lay helpless upon the Aoql 
of the hut, quite unable to move, so exhausted were we. 
In turning my head around I discovered ten large demi¬ 
johns, some two and one-half feet high and about two 
feet in diameter, of thick green glass. They were the 
usual demijohns— garaffons, as they are called — used 
all over Brazil for “ fire-water.” I at once conceived 
the idea of using them as floats in the construction of a 
raft. 
My men grinned contemptuously at the idea when I 
mentioned it to them. They said that all was over. It 
was no use trying to get away. The Almighty wanted 
us to die, and we must only lie there and await our end, 
which was not far off. Benedicto struggled to his knees 
and prayed to the Almighty and the Virgin, sobbing bit¬ 
terly all the time. 
I struggled up on my feet and proceeded to carry the 
big vessels to the river bank, where I intended to con¬ 
struct the raft. The effort to take each heavy bottle 
those few metres seemed almost beyond me in my ex¬ 
hausted state. At last I proceeded to strip the floor of 
the hut, which had been made with split assahy palms 
(Euterpe oleracea L.), in order that I might make i 
frame to which I could fasten the bottles. With a gred 
deal of persuasion I got Filippe and Benedicto to help 
me. The long pieces of assahy were too heavy for our 
purpose, and we had the additional trouble of splitting 
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