ACROSS UNKNOWN SOUTH AMERICA 
set that day we arrived at S. Isabel or Castanho, where 
I had the pleasure of meeting the greatest man upon that 
river— Colonel R. E. Brazil, a man of immense strength 
of will and enterprise. He went under the name, which 
he well deserved, of the “ King of the Tapajoz for it 
was he who indeed held the key of that river, nearly the 
entire commerce on that great waterway being, directly 
or indirectly, in his hands. 
October twentieth was spent at S. Isabel, where a 
great fleet of boats was waiting to be loaded with thou¬ 
sands upon thousands of kilos of magnificent rubber. 
Both Colonel Brazil and his employes treated me with 
great deference, and made preparations to get a boat 
ready at once for me to continue my journey down 
the stream. In fact, Colonel Brazil, who would not hear 
of my paying for being conveyed down stream, insisted 
upon my being his guest, and declared that he himself 
would take me to a point where I might be able to get 
a steamer. 
When all the boats were ready, at four p.m. on Oc¬ 
tober twentieth, we proceeded on our journey down the 
Tapajoz by a small channel on the right side of the river, 
in order to visit some of the trading sheds belonging to 
Colonel Brazil, especially those at the mouth of the 
Crepore River, which was 100 metres wide where it 
entered the Tapajoz on the right side. The scenery was 
beautiful, the hills getting higher as we proceeded north, 
some of the islands we passed also being of great height 
and forming picturesque scenes, especially against the 
gorgeous tints of the sky at sunset. 
I was interested in observing the wonderful regu¬ 
larity of the sky-line along the forest. It looked as if 
the trees had been trimmed artificially in a perfectly 
straight line. The fleet which Colonel Brazil was taking 
down the river consisted of eight large boats. I was 
much impressed by the force of mind of this gentleman, 
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