led me whenever I asked for
information.

A few minutes after we had left, I was seized with violent shivers, my
teeth chattered, and I felt quite as frozen as if I had suddenly dropped
in the Arctic regions. Evidently I had been poisoned by the water. I
collapsed under my load, and for some moments I could not get up again.
Although I had spent all my time and energy helping everybody else to get
up when in difficulty, not one of my men came near me to unfasten the
loads from my shoulders or help me to get up on my legs again. They
merely squatted a little way off when they saw that I had collapsed, and
proceeded to roll up their cigarettes and smoke.

True, I did not let my men suspect that I was very ill. After a few
minutes I struggled up once more under my heavy load and asked the men to
come along. I had been seized with such a violent attack of fever that my
strength seemed to have vanished all of a sudden, my limbs quivering in a
most alarming way. I carried a clinical thermometer on my person. My
temperature was 104 deg. F. From ten o'clock in the morning until three in
the afternoon the attack of fever was so acute that several times I fell
down. My men, who were in a pitiable condition that day, collapsed, now
one, now another, although their loads were less than half the weight of
mine, each man carrying about 40 lb. We marched until four o'clock that
afternoon, but only covered a distance of 6 kil. in that entire day. Two
of the men had abandoned their loads altogether, as they could not carry
them any farther. What vexed me considerably was that they had discarded
my valuable things in preference to leaving the great weight of rubbish
of their own which they insisted on carrying, such as looking-glasses,
combs, brushes, a number of old clothes in shreds, and the heavy
hammocks, which weighed not less than 20 lb. each.

We found water in a streamlet which formed a marsh. There my men insisted
on making camp. It was a most unhealthy spot. Ill as I was, I endeavoured
to induce them to come on a little farther and see if we could improve on
that halting-place. Miguel, the Indian, who had slightly scratched his
finger, now refused to cut the _picada_ any longer, as he said the pain
was intense. It was only by giving him a present of money that I had
succeeded in leading the man on until we reached the marsh.

Curiously enough, the man X, who was the champion rascal of the crowd,
proved himself that day to be