. Clouds of aigrette storks could be
seen in the evening circling about, thousands and thousands of them. They
produced a most curious effect in the distance against the heavy black
clouds of the sky.

We entered the Yanna Yakka stream, the water of which was almost
absolutely stagnant and as black as ink, full of snakes, fish, and
crocodiles. Yanna Yakka in the local Indian language means "black water."
We steamed for two hours up that river as far as Porto Central, the river
being quite narrow--only 150 m. wide. We eventually arrived at the
prettiest spot I had so far seen on the river, called Porto Principal. On
an elongated island not more than 80 m. wide were to be seen four large
buildings of _bona_ palm, with spacious verandas and corrugated iron
roofs. The buildings were connected by high bridges. All those structures
were built on piles 12 ft. high. Many _chapaha_ palms of great height
were to be seen there.

I heard at that place an extraordinary account of how a dirigible
balloon, with nobody on board, had some few years before passed over the
house. The balloon--which my informant, in his ignorant language, called
a "huge square globe"--flew, according to him, a flag, the stars and
stripes, and had an anchor dangling down. The balloon was travelling in a
westerly direction. It flew a little higher than the trees, and caused a
great scare among the natives. My informant told me that there was no one
in the car at all, but they waved their hands at him (_sic_) when they
passed over his house! He then told me that the air-ship had passed in
the daytime and had quickly disappeared, but that it was beautifully
lighted with coloured lights at night. So that it would be difficult from
that truthful account to place much reliance on what the man said or on
what he had seen at all. It is quite possible--after discarding all the
indisputable embroidery from the story--that a balloon actually went over
that place, and it may probably have been Wellman's abandoned balloon
with which he had tried to go across the Atlantic.

On January 3rd and 4th we had no great excitement. We stopped at
numberless places. Nearly all the houses in that district were made in
three sections, the two end rooms enclosed in _bona_-palm walls, while
the central and larger room had two open sides. All the houses were
perched up on piles, owing to the frequent inundations. Sewing-machines
and gramophones were to be found in nearly every house.