children of the garrison were at the doors
and windows; there were women and girls with skins as fair as any in
the northland, and others that were predominantly negro. Most were of
intervening shades. All this was paralleled among the men; and the
fusion of the colors was going on steadily.

Around the village black vultures were gathered. Not long before
reaching it we passed some rounded green trees, their tops covered
with the showy wood-ibis; at the same time we saw behind them, farther
inland, other trees crowded with the more delicate forms of the
shining white egrets.

The river now widened so that in places it looked like a long lake; it
wound in every direction through the endless marshy plain, whose
surface was broken here and there by low mountains. The splendor of
the sunset I never saw surpassed. We were steaming east toward clouds
of storm. The river ran, a broad highway of molten gold, into the
flaming sky; the far-off mountains loomed purple across the marshes;
belts of rich green, the river banks stood out on either side against
the rose-hues of the rippling water; in front, as we forged steadily
onward, hung the tropic night, dim and vast.

On December 15 we reached Corumba. For three or four miles before it
is reached the west bank, on which it stands, becomes high rocky
ground, falling away into cliffs. The country roundabout was evidently
well peopled. We saw gauchos, cattle-herders--the equivalent of our
own cowboys--riding along the bank. Women were washing clothes, and
their naked children bathing, on the shore; we were told that caymans
and piranhas rarely ventured near a place where so much was going on,
and that accidents generally occurred in ponds or lonely stretches of
the river. Several steamers came out to meet us, and accompanied us
for a dozen miles, with bands playing and the passengers cheering,
just as if we were nearing some town on the Hudson.

Corumba is on a steep hillside, with wide, roughly paved streets, some
of them lined with beautiful trees that bear scarlet flowers, and with
well-built houses, most of them of one story, some of two or three
stories. We were greeted with a reception by the municipal council,
and were given a state dinner. The hotel, kept by an Italian, was as
comfortable as possible--stone floors, high ceilings, big windows and
doors, a cool, open courtyard, and a shower-bath. Of course Corumba is
still a frontier town. The vehicles ox-carts and mule-c