RECOLLECTIONS OF AN ILL-FATED EXPEDITION.* IT is now thirty years
since the last practical attempt was made at opening up the great natural resources of Bolivia. Cut off by Chile from the waters of the Pacific, the inhabitants of that inland Republic sought an outlet to the Atlantic by the vast waterways of South America. But the falls and rapids of the Brazilian rivers Madeira and llamore inter- posed an impassable barrier to navigation. To the ingenuity, however, of the engineer it seemed that this difficulty might be overcome by the construction of a railway round and above them. A line of steamboats established on the navigable waters would lead to the maintenance of a great system of international transportation between the heart of Bolivia and
* Recollections of an Ill-fated Exwelitton to the Headuaters of the Madeira River in Brasil. By Neville B. Cr•ig, in co-operation with members of the • The Flowers and their Story. By Hilcleric Friend. With 155 Illustrations Madeira and Mamore Associations of 'hiladelphia. With Illustrations. of Flowers and Flower Studies from the Author's Photographs, and 8 Coloured Loudon J. B. Lippincott Company. [18a. net.] Plates. London : Robert Cully. [Si. net.]
New York City, a distance of five thousand five hundred miles. The unsuccessful attempt to construct that railway and the sufferings of the pioneers form the subject of the present book, and they certainly make a most vivid history of what the railway engineer has to endure and suffer in tropical South America. The country through which the railway had to pass was an unbroken and unexplored wilderness ; here and there a few rubber-gatherers and traders were to be found scattered along the river bank; but the only inhabitants of the interior were cannibal tribes, with countless varieties of beasts, reptiles, and of insects, whose ceaseless persecution, aided by malignant malarial fevers, made life a burden to civilised human beings. The discomfiture of the expedition was no fault of the men at the front. They were racked by sickness and misery, their supply of provisions failed, and a host of minor misfortunes, due in many cases to defective organisation, beset them from the very first. Nevertheless they struggled on until the company got involved in litigation in England, and an Order in Chancery tied up the funds. The contractors were unable to pay the employes, and at last the enterprise was abandoned after a fourth of the white men engaged in it had lost their lives. Some day the work will be accomplished, for there is a great future before South America when the northern half of that hemisphere is fully settled, and far greater natural obstacles have been surmounted ere now by engineering science and human endurance. But Bolivia will have to evolve a more settled government before the necessary capital can be attracted within her borders. The book is too long by at least a half, and owes little to literary art ; but the actual narrative of the working parties round the falls is vivid and entertaining. It is characteristic of the present trend of feeling in the United States that the author should remark A minute fraction of the money wasted in and in consequence of the war with Spain would have changed failure into brilliant success, would have established a perma- nent community of interest between ourselves and the nations south of us, and would have given us a commanding influence in the commerce of the two Americas."
Previous page
