*

Brazilians it generally only affects those lately come from up country. There is an antidote daily advertised in the paper called "Anti-Yellow Fever Vaccination;" but I hear it is all a farce, and that Pasteur's theory has not been worked out on this subject. Some such discovery is urgently needed, as there is no doubt the disease is a fearful scourge. A Dutch captain arriving in port when the fever was at its height was very nervous about it, and within three days the captain, his wife, nephew, and one or two others were dead; all the crew went off, and it was some time before a captain and crew could be found to take the ship back to Holland.†

I am told that Dr. Bento (Brazilian) and Dr. King (English) are the best yellow fever doctors; the latter has spent about twenty years in Brazil, and has a large practice, but he informed me the other day that there is still room for two good English surgeons in Rio.

"It is worthy of note that Dr. Maximiano Carvalho announces in the Journal de Commercio, of the 13th inst., that some of the recent yellow fever cases are those of persons vaccinated with Dr. Freire's microbios."-Rio News, January 15, 1884.

In 1882 the fever was very severe. From January to March, 10,000 or 12,000 died from it; sometimes 150 per diem.

CHAPTER X.

LAST DAYS IN BRAZIL.

Ascent of the Corcovado.

July 6.-After church I went for a cup of coffee and a little loaf to the Carioca Café, and then jumped into a Larangeiras tram-car en route for the Corcovado. I was told by some Brazilians afterwards that no one but a mad Englishman would think of going on such an expedition, firstly, on foot all the way when a horse could have been hired; secondly, in the heat of the day; thirdly, in top hat, frock-coat, and Sunday-go-to-meeting attire. However, I did it. For some two miles from the heart of the city the cars go southwards on the Botafogo Road, and then turn to the right at a square called Praça do Duque de Caxias, where are some very fine avenues of palms of a great height. The cars proceed thence up the Rua das Larangeiras, which is quite lovely with well-built and gaily painted houses in the midst of most beautiful gardens, and the road is lined by huge wide-spreading trees covered with hanging lichens; while between sunken walls on the left of the road flows a shallow stream, which is crossed by little wooden bridges to the garden gates of the various houses. As one proceeds, the road winds about and ascends slightly through a gradually narrowing valley, bounded by

two ridges descending from the Corcovado, forest clad throughout, and with "chacaras" (country houses) peeping out of groves of palms and clumps of bananas in clearings in the forest. Leaving the tram-car at its terminal point, 40 metres (131 feet) above the sea, at 1.45 p.m. I began the ascent, and, proceeding over a very rough, zigzag road, reached the fine broad main road, leading to the hill of Santa Theresa, at a height of 220 metres (621 feet), at which point I came to the railway in course of construction, which is being built by a private company, from Larangeiras to the summit of the Corcovado, on the central cogwheel system-also employed on the Petropolis railway, which I shall hope to describe when I have visited it. At the point where I reached the railway, it crosses a very high viaduct on a steep incline; the bases of the piers are of stone, and the superstructure of angle and tee irons, on which rest the girders (three spans, lattice), carrying the cross girders and rails, a hand-rail being placed on each side. Seen from above, or, indeed, from either end, this viaduct looks very awkward, the rails having a very ugly S curve-the cross girders being also laid to the same curve-which is decidedly objectionable. The engineering features at this point are the most remarkable part of the line, as the railway, after crossing the viaduct over a deep gorge, enters a tremendous cutting on a curve, with a still stiffer gradient of perhaps one in five, the cutting being at least a hundred feet deep. Leaving the viaduct, I walked up this cutting and proceeded partly over the banks and through the cuttings of the railway and partly by the road, making occasional short cuts along steep by-paths, inspecting en route the works of the railway and the wellconstructed stone abutments at the edges of deep gorges, which are to be spanned by girders. The whole route lay

through dense forest of the usual luxuriant type; but the palms, cycads, etc., and large trees are more frequent, and the parasitic orchids and other epiphytes more luxuriant than in the high country of the part of Minas I was in. The birds, however, are fewer, and there are no parrots or monkeys, except a few marmosets, which is not to be wondered at, being so near the metropolis. There were occasional charming glimpses through the forest of the city and the Organ Mountains. At length I reached Peineiras, where there is a "chacara” and a few other buildings.

This spot is 439 metres (1430 feet) above the sea. The concessionaires of the railway intend building a grand hotel here, and founding a colony, to induce the citizens and foreigners to live up at this place during the summer instead of going to Petropolis, as this will be within an hour by rail and tram from the centre of the city, whereas Petropolis is considerably more than two hours' journey. It is certainly an enchanting spot, and magnificent views of the Atlantic are to be seen within a few minutes' walk.

On reaching the main shoulder of the mountain, the Atlantic burst suddenly in view, and from this point began the stiffest part of the climb. I gained the summit in one hour and seven minutes after leaving the train, including rests -tolerably quick, as the summit is 712 metres (2196 feet), which gave over two thousand feet ascent per hour. It was a stiff pull up, and, though shaded much of the way by the lofty forest trees and tangled masses of creepers, was intensely hot work. Every stitch on me was dripping wet, and I should have liked a cloak to ward off the chilly wind which blew over the top.

The summit consists of two rounded masses of bare rock, walled in to prevent accidents, which would be only.

too likely to occur, as on one side the mountain descends perpendicularly over a thousand feet. On the summit are many steps cut in the live rock, without which it would be difficult to keep one's foothold. When I arrived there were three natives in shirt-sleeves and with long sticks. I thought how easily they might go for me, rifle my pockets, and throw me over the wall, a sheer thousand feet, into the virgin forest beneath. However, they did not perpetrate the ghastly deed, or I could hardly have written these lines.

How can I describe this view? It almost passes description. With a perfectly cloudless sky, the eye ranged from the Organ Mountains on the north side, some fifty miles away, to Cape Frio, seventy-five miles to the east, and to a cape beyond the Ilha Grande, near Paraty, some seventy miles or more to the west; while to the south lay the broad expanse of the Atlantic, whose ripplets broke in silver threads upon the sandy shores, or dashed against precipitous rocks. All the mountains on the Nichteroy side appeared a promiscuous mass of dark green hillocks. The whole of the Bay of Rio de Janeiro, with its countless islands, was mapped out. At a dizzy depth below lay the vast city; its numerous morros, or hills, scarcely appearing to rise above the plain. The Sugar-loaf (1383 feet) seemed a ninepin. To the west--by glimpses through the roughand-tumble forest-clad mountains, among which are the square-topped rock Gavea, and the Two Brothers-were lovely scraps of the Atlantic and the cape in the far distance, on the borders of the province of São Paolo. The horizon of the Atlantic was lost in haze; but on its blue bosom were seen, as tiny white specks, ships in full sail, and one or two steamers. I watched one of the latter, the Advance, coming in from New York. It presently entered