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PREFACE 
ing Indian languages: Bororo, Apiacar, Mundurucu, 
Campas or Antis. 
(j) The expedition has furthermore shown that it is 
possible with poor material in the way of followers to 
accomplish work of unusual difficulty. 
( k ) That it is possible for people in a normal condi¬ 
tion of health to go at least sixteen days without food 
while doing hard work. 
(/) That it is possible to cross an entire continent — 
for one entire year — in the company of dangerous and 
lazy criminals without any weapon for protection — not 
even a penknife — and to bring forth from such poor 
material remarkable qualities of endurance, courage, and 
almost superhuman energy. 
( m ) Last, but not least, on that expedition I was able 
to collect further evidence that a theory I had long held 
as to the present shape of the earth was correct. I had 
never believed in the well-known theory that a continent, 
now submerged, once existed between America, Europe, 
and Africa — in other words, where the Atlantic Ocean 
is now. That theory has found many followers. In 
support of it one is told that such islands as Madeira, 
the Canaries, the Azores, are the topmost peaks of a now 
partly submerged range of mountains which once stood 
upon that vanished continent. It is also a common be¬ 
lief that Northern Africa underwent the contrary process, 
and was pushed up from under the sea. That is why, 
it is said, the Sahara Desert, which was formerly, with¬ 
out doubt, an ocean bed, is now dry and above water. 
One has only to look at any map of the entire world 
to see what really happened to the earth in days long 
gone by. Let me first of all tell you that there never 
existed a continent between Africa and South America. 
In fact, I doubt whether there is as much as a square 
mile between those two continents more submerged to-day 
than it was thousands upon thousands of years ago. 
