o steamboat was allowed
to go without one--whom I had to pay at the rate of L7 15_s._ sterling a
day. A cook had to be employed for the crew, as none of the sailors could
be induced to condescend to be the chef. Two applicants were eventually
found. One who was willing to do the cooking at a salary of L3 10_s._ a
day, his chief ability, said he, consisting in boiling rice and fish.
Another fellow eventually undertook the job at a salary of L1 10_s._ a
day, he being willing to do the cooking at such a small salary as he
said he had never in his life cooked before, and he did not know whether
we should care for his cooking or not. It must not for one moment be
believed that these men were trying to cheat me, and putting on prices,
for indeed these are the current rates for everybody who wishes to travel
in those regions. The cost of commodities of any kind in Manaos was
excessive, and went beyond even the limits of robbery. I went into a
chemist's shop to purchase a small bottle of quinine tablets, worth in
England perhaps eightpence or a shilling. The price charged there was L2
10_s._

Principally owing to the Booth Line Steamship Company and the allied
companies, Manaos has become a good-sized place. The Harbour Works and
the works made by the Manaos Improvements, Ltd., have been a great boon
to that place, and have made it almost as civilized as a third-class
European city. But obstacles have been placed in the way of honest
foreign companies carrying on their work successfully, the unscrupulous
behaviour of the Governor and the attitude of the mob having proved
serious drawbacks to the development of the place.

[Illustration: La Mercedes.]

[Illustration: The Avenue of Eucalypti near the Town of Tarma (Andes).]

Large sums of money have been wasted in building a strawberry-coloured
theatre of immense size and of appalling architectural lines, on the top
of which has been erected a tiled dome of gigantic proportions over an
immense water-tank in order to protect the theatre against fire. The
water-tank was calculated to let down a great cascade of water, a regular
Niagara, on the flames--as well as on the spectators, I presume. After it
had been built it was discovered that if water were let into the tank,
its weight would be enough to bring down the entire upper part of the
theatre; so that it could never be filled at all.

Except for one or two short avenues, which reminded one of the suburbs of
new North Ameri