unt for her every morning!"

"Yes," answered Filippe, "no more pack-saddles to fix, no more leading
the animals to drink. She"--pointing to the canoe--"can drink all the
time if she likes...."

Filippe was a prophet. The canoe did "drink" all the time, much to our
concern. Little did my men suspect before we started that they would have
the hardest time of their lives--so hard, indeed, that it was amazing
humans could endure it at all.

One of the three seringueiros at Porto Velho interested me greatly. He
was a tall, gentlemanly, refined person, who seldom uttered a word. I
noticed that he avoided meeting me, and, although extremely civil, seemed
afraid to enter into conversation. The little shed he had built himself
(7 ft. by 4 ft., and 7 ft. high) was extraordinarily neat, and open on
all sides--quite unlike the sheds Brazilian rubber collectors build
themselves.

From my tent I watched him. The man got up before sunrise every day,
going at once to the river for a swim. Humming some sort of a song, he
would then go through a series of gymnastic exercises, interrupted by
sonorous slaps upon different parts of his anatomy to kill impertinent
mosquitoes, of which there were swarms on the Arinos River. That done, he
would assume a suit of working-clothes, and, returning to his shed, would
pick up his tools and noiselessly depart, so as not to disturb our sleep!
At sunset, when he returned, he immediately proceeded to the river to
have another swim and to get rid of the many insects which always
collected upon one's person in going through the forest. Then he put on a
clean suit of clothes, and, saluting us from a distance, went to his shed
to rest.

I was certain the man was not a Brazilian, but as curiosity is not one of
my chief characteristics I took no special notice of him. This brought
him round to my tent one evening. The man was a German by birth, of a
good family and excellent education. He could speak German, English,
French, Spanish and Portuguese to perfection, and was well versed in the
literature of those languages. He had evidently drifted about for many
years in many parts of South America in search of a fortune, in the
Argentine, in Uruguay, and had ended by becoming a slave in Brazil. Yes,
the poor old man was a voluntary slave. He had borrowed from his employer
and was unable to repay. He was therefore a slave in the true sense of
the word, as his employer could, according to local custom, sell hi