United States or Comoros ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The mouth of this river had long been known, but its upper course for half its length was absolutely unknown when Rondon descended it. Among those who took part under him in this piece of exploration were the present Captain Amilcar and Lieutenant Lyra; and two better or more efficient men for such wilderness work it would be impossible to find. They acted as his two chief assistants on our trip.
The sketch-maps and surveying and cartographical work generally were to be made under the supervision of Colonel Rondon by Lyra, with assistance from Fiala and Kermit. Captain Amilcar handled the worst problem transportation; the medical member was Doctor Cajazeira.
Meanwhile Amilcar had ascended the Jacyparana a month or two previously with provisions to meet them; for at that time the maps incorrectly treated this river as larger, instead of smaller, than the Gy-Parana, which they were in fact descending; and Colonel Rondon had supposed that they were going down the former stream. Amilcar returned after himself suffering much hardship and danger.
We were only some six miles from our place of embarkation on the Duvida, and we divided our party and our belongings. Amilcar, Miller, Mello, and Oliveira were to march three days to the Gy-Parana, and then descend it, and continue down the Madeira to Manaos.
This was what the stiffnecked Condottiere was now doing as fast as his best enemies could have wished. His people hated him so bitterly that he would certainly have worn mail had not Molly been his mail. They spared him because they loved her, and believed that he still had her heart. "Amilcar, uxoris gratia, Dux," was now the fact.
With extreme difficulty had Rome held up her head ever since the battle of Cannae; though it were so, that Hannibal alone, with little help from Carthage, had continued the war in Italy. But there was now arrived another son of Amilcar; and one that, in his present expedition, had seemed a man of more sufficiency than Hannibal himself.
We had been camped close to the river, where the trail that follows the telegraph line crosses it by a rough bridge. As our laden dugouts swung into the stream, Amilcar and Miller and all the others of the Gy-Parana party were on the banks and the bridge to wave farewell and wish us good-by and good luck. It was the height of the rainy season, and the swollen torrent was swift and brown.
My boat was once capsized in a moment in a squall, and Hannibal and myself were soused in the water before we knew what had happened. I caught hold of the bilge of the boat, and nearly drowned myself with laughing at the Son of Amilcar, who was splashing about shrieking with terror, and swallowing quarts of salt-water, as his open mouth popped every moment under a wave.
All the skins, skulls, and alcoholic specimens, and all the baggage not absolutely necessary, were sent back down the Paraguay and to New York, in charge of Harper. The separate baggage-trains, under the charge of Captain Amilcar, were organized to go in one detachment.
We were no less rejoiced to learn that Amilcar, the head of the party that went down the Gy-Parana, was also all right, although his canoe too had been upset in the rapids, and his instruments and all his notes lost. He had reached Manaos on April 10. Fiala had gone home. Miller was collecting near Manaos. He had been doing capital work. The piranhas were bad here, and no one could bathe.
Word Of The Day