CHAPTER XXV 
Prom Iquitos to the Foot of the Andes up the Rivers Ucayalli, 
Pachitea and Pichis—The Cashibos or “Vampire Indians” 
T HE change in the characteristics of the people the 
moment you were in Peru was considerable, and 
striking was the neatness of the buildings. Iquitos 
was a pleasant little city, the streets of which needed 
paving badly, but were otherwise well aligned and tidy. 
There were numbers of foreigners there, including a small 
English colony made up of employes of the Booth Line 
and the representatives of a few commercial houses. It is 
difficult to realize how pleasant Englishmen can be when 
they live in those out-of-the-way places. 
After the Putumayo atrocities a proper English con¬ 
sulate, in charge of Mr. Mitchell, formerly our vice-consul 
in Paris, had been established there. Yellow fever was 
rampant at that time in Iquitos, and reaped many victims 
daily. 
Although Iquitos was 2,300 kilometres farther up the 
river than Manaos, the price of all commodities in that 
country was less than half those in Manaos, and the 
quality of the articles twice as good. That is what comes 
of having free trade instead of a high tariff. 
I spent a pleasant Christmas in Iquitos, all the English 
residents there showing me the greatest kindness. From 
Iquitos the river was no longer navigable for ocean-going 
steamers, and it was necessary to travel by small launches. 
There was no regular service, but there were a number of 
trading launches which went a certain distance up the 
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