ACROSS UNKNOWN SOUTH AMERICA 
do to scramble out of the cabin. The boat had sprung 
a great leak as big as a man’s hand, which had been 
stopped up, and which had suddenly opened —- hence the 
misfortune. 
This sudden immersion in cold water gave me another 
bad attack of fever, as I had to sit the entire night in 
wet pajamas, while the crews of all the other boats were 
summoned in order to raise the boat once more, a work 
which lasted several hours. 
Next morning, when we departed, Colonel Brazil lent 
me some of his clothes, while all my things were spread 
on the roofs of the various boats to dry in the sun. I 
never shall forget Colonel Brazil’s amusement and that 
of his men when I unpacked some of the boxes, which 
had once been water-tight, and pulled out a dress-suit, a 
frock coat, and other such stylish garments, now all wet 
and muddy, and some twenty pairs of shoes, all in a ter¬ 
rible condition, mildewed and soaked with the moisture 
they had absorbed in the forest and during the last 
immersion. 
Near the tributary Montanha, on the left side of the 
main stream, were two small rapids. A rich rubber- 
producing land was situated a day and a half’s journey 
along that tributary. The best way to reach it was from 
a place called El Frances, one of the most charming spots 
I saw on the lower Tapajoz River. The central hill at 
Montanha was 300 feet high, the hills around it from 
200 to 300 feet high. 
Farther down we came to the Rio Jamanchin, a tribu¬ 
tary on the right side of the Tapajoz, which entered the 
river where great sand shallows occupied nearly half the 
width of the stream. 
Colonel Brazil was the happy possessor of immense 
concessions on that tributary stream — in fact, as far as 
the Tocantins River, a tributary on the left side of the 
Jamanchin. He had already made a mule trail across 
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