that the animals were deserting our part of the forest. During these
three weeks we were not wholly idle. The Chief had the men out every
day making excursions in the neighbourhood to locate the caoutchouc
trees. As soon as a tree was found, they set to work bleeding the
base of it to let the milky sap ooze out on the ground where it would
collect in a small pool. Then they would fell the tree and cut rings
in the bark at regular intervals so that the milk could flow out. In
a few days when the milk had coagulated, forming large patches of
caoutchouc, they would return for it. The pieces were washed in the
creek and then tied into large bundles ready for transporting.

In all they located more than 800 caoutchouc trees. At this time too I
made my remarkable discovery of gold deposits in the creek. It seems
to me now like the plot of some old morality play, for while we were
searching eagerly for the thing that we considered the ultimate goal
of human desires--wealth, the final master, Death, was closing his
net upon us day by day. Our food supply was nearly gone.

While strolling along the shores of the creek in search of game, I
noticed irregular clumps or nodules of clay which had accumulated in
large quantities in the bed of the stream, especially where branches
and logs had caused whirlpools and eddies to form. They had the
appearance of pebbles or stones, and were so heavy in proportion to
their size that my curiosity was aroused, and throwing one of them
on the bank I split it open with my machete. My weakened heart then
commenced to beat violently, for what I saw looked like gold.

I took the two pieces to my working table near our _tambo_, and
examining the dirty-yellow heart with my magnifying glass, I found the
following: A central mass about one cubic inch in size, containing