Working North from Patagonia; Being the Narrative of a Journey Earned on the Way Through Southern and Eastern South America. Being the Narrative of a

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1921. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XXI ROAMING THE THREE GUIANAS *HE white steamers of the Compagnie Generate Transatlantique take two leisurely days from Georgetown to Cayenne, which I spent in furbishing up my long unused French. I had not intended to leave British Guiana so soon, but it would still be there when I came back and transportation between the three European colonies of South America is not frequent enough to scorn any passing chance with impunity. Four typical Frenchmen of the tropics, in pointed beards not recently trimmed and the white toadstool helmets without which they would no more expect to survive than if they left off their flannel waist-bands, put themselves, unasked, at my disposal. It was still dark on the second morning when there loomed out of the tropical night three isolated granite rocks, with what was evidently a thin covering of grass and bush and dotted with scattered lights. Their official name is Isles du Salut. but the more popular and exact term for the whole group is that properly belonging to one of them--Devil's Island. The water about them is very deep, and our ship went close inshore. Soon two boatloads of people, rowed by deeply sunburned white prisoners in the tam-o'-shanter caps of Latin Quarter studios, appeared through the growing dawn, tumbled a few passengers and the baggage of a family from Paris aboard us, then the commander of the isles and his kin and cronies were rowed back again from their monthly excursion to the outside world. Just two hours later we stopped far out near a lighthouse on a rock called the Enfant Perdu, a low coast with some wooded hills and a rather insignificant looking town several miles off. The water was already yellowish-brown, and there was not enough of it to allow the steamer to draw nearer. ...