CHAPTER XXV 
The Blue Mountains — The Cuyaba River — Inaccurate Maps—A 
Rebellion in Camp — Infamy of Author’s Followers — The Lagoa 
dos Veados and the Seven Lakes — Falling Back on Diamantino 
—Another Mutiny — Slavery — Descending from the Tableland 
W E had gone ninety-six kilometres in four days’ 
marching since leaving the Rio Manso. We were 
only a few kilometres from the Serra Azul, or Blue 
Mountains — truly mountains of the most vivid and purest 
cobalt blue I had ever seen — quite a wonderful spectacle. 
We made our camp in a prairie with good grazing 
for our animals. Although we were at a comparatively 
low elevation —1,150 feet above the sea level — the 
minimum temperature of the atmosphere was 56° Fahren¬ 
heit during the night. 
On leaving camp — still proceeding north — we de¬ 
scended to 1,100 feet into a lovely stretch of magnificent 
grass with a lagoon. The level of the water was low, as 
we were then at the end of the dry season. On the flat 
grassy land were curious semispherical mounds, four to six 
metres in diameter and from two to six feet high. On each 
of these mounds were a few stunted trees. No trees 
whatever existed except upon these small mounds, the 
explanation being, I think, that the mounds had formed 
around the trees while these were growing, and not that 
the trees had grown upon the mounds. 
As we were getting nearer, the Serra Azul to the north 
was most impressive. I think that it was partly due to 
the bluish foliage of the vegetation upon it that the range, 
even close by, appeared of so vivid a blue, and also to the 
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