in boats, carrying from 5 to 6 tons of freight, at an average of 3 miles per hour, while they descend at the rate of about 9 miles per hour. The banks of these rivers are more or less elevated, while spreading out along their shores, and often extending for many leagues into the interior, are magnificent forests of the finest qualities of cabinet woods known to the lumber districts of the world. These rivers afford the only means of communication between the Beni country and the rest of the Republic, while they connect the eastern part of the country with the Atlantic Ocean by means of the Amazon. Vast quantities of Bolivian rubber are annually brought down these rivers to Villa Bella and here transferred to canoes by the Indians and carried past the 230 miles of falls and rapids of the Madeira to San Antonio, the terminus of steam navigation between Para, 700 miles below, and the upper Amazon tributaries.
Although this region is hot, having a temperature ranging from 27° to 32° C., it is nevertheless healthful. So equable is the climate, that the changes of seasons are hardly noticeable, while the transition from summer to winter is chiefly marked by copious rains, which so increase the rivers that the low plains of the Beni are converted for the time into vast lagoons, which are navigated by canoes during this season. Here, in this remote and perhaps least known region of South America, whose flora and fauna equal if they do not excel those of Brazil, are innumerable birds of rare and exquisite plumage, myriads of butterflies of the most delicate hues, every variety of fish known to frequent inland waters, rich river valleys and hilly districts unsurpassed in their wealth of soil, agricultural products, medicinal plants, aromatic gums and spices and auriferous deposits, while in its rich meadows, graze more than 600,000 head of splendid cattle worth in the country but from $2.50 to $3 per head, or about 5 bolivianos.
Bordering the Purus River, and spreading over the districts of Mapiri and Tipuani to the west and the river districts of the Beni
