144 
THE GOLDEN RIVER. 
off to bake some bread, with frequent shouts to 
me of e What do you call baking powder in 
Spanish!’ or ‘How can I explain to Jerman 
that he must on no account open the oven door ? ’ 
A tiny breeze got up, and flapped the linen 
hanging out to air, and now and again we went 
out on deck to see if the fishermen were in sight. 
Sometimes we had been able, with our glasses, 
to watch the playing and landing of a dorado, 
and even to catch something of the tense strain 
and excitement of the tiny doll figures in their 
chip of a boat, whilst the Capitan and Jerman 
hung breathlessly on our exclamations and 
groaned as heavily as the fishermen themselves 
when the leaping surging dot we knew to be a 
dorado broke and got away. 
Ten o’clock, and they might be back at any 
moment, just time to finish before the Capitan 
called that they were coming. There was the 
little canoe, like a dark straw on the river, and 
we watched its approach, and could see a gleam 
of gold at the bottom of it. The sun was getting 
high, the hot air already shimmered and danced 
above the water, and a flock of parrots screamed 
in the treetops. Already the engineer was 
trying his engines, and the launch was shivering 
like a highly-bred fox-terrier, keen to start. 
It was exciting, when the canoe was within 
hail, to hear how many fish had been caught, 
and to see the splendid red gold of the huge 
dorado as they were hoisted on deck, to a chorus 
