Boy Scouts in an Airship | Page 9

get down to figures," Jack continued. "We ought to be

able to get to the mouth of the Amazon on a fast boat, with the Black
Bear and the Wolf on board, in a week or ten days-say ten days. About
that time they will be getting into Paraguay. What do you think of it?"
"Fine!" cried Harry.
"The best ever!" Frank responded. "But what then? We can't run up to
Paraguay in the Black Bear."
"We can get away up in the Andes," answered Jack, with the map of
Brazil before him. "See these crooked little lines? Well, those are rivers.
Just see how far we can go in a motor boat."
"But that won't bring us to the aeroplane," Frank objected.
"Yes, it will," Harry answered. "They are coming back by way of the
Amazon valley, and we can't miss them. Oh, what's the use? Suppose
we begin packing?"
"Well, I don't know exactly what we are to do after we get up the
Amazon," Harry laughed, "but I'm game to go. There are head-hunters
and cannibals up there, and we may find a little amusement."
"We're going after Ned and Jimmie," Jack explained. "This is a relief
expedition! After they get to Paraguay they'll snatch that Lyman person
out of the cold, damp dungeon keep he is supposed to be in and then
sail off over the Amazon valley. There's where we catch up with them.
Do you suppose we can find a ship going to the mouth of the Amazon
early in the morning?"
"You certainly are fierce when you get started!" laughed Harry. "Well,"
he added, "you can't get ready any too soon to please me."
It was two days before the boys found a vessel going their way, and
even then Jack insisted that his father bribed the owners to run off their
course in order to set the boys and their motorboats down at the mouth
of the Amazon river. The boat, however, was a fast one, equal in speed
to a modern ocean liner; and in ten days from the time of starting from

New York--on the 12th of August--the boys were stemming the current
of the great river--more like a shoreless sea there at the mouth than a
river!
"Huh!" Frank exclaimed, as they left the island of Joannes to the south,
"this is no river! It is a blooming sea!"
"Pretty near three hundred miles wide at the delta, including that big
island," Harry said. "It is some river, eh?"
"Four thousand miles long!" Jack contributed. "It is navigable for
commercial purposes for 2,200 miles, and our boats can go up clear to
the foot of the Andes."
"Boats went there in the days of Columbus," Frank said. "A companion
of Columbus first discovered this great delta. The river fertilizes two
million square miles of territory, and is the greatest water system in the
world."
"Why," Harry observed, desiring to contribute something startling to
the discussion of the river, "the current is so strong that it carries fresh
water and sand five hundred miles out into the Atlantic Ocean. It is just
a fresh water river in a salt water sea for five hundred miles!"
That night the boys kept the engines of the Black Bear going, one
remaining on watch all through the dark hours. They had plenty of
gasoline in the tank, and the tender, the Wolf, was carrying a load of
fuel which Jack declared would last them until the end of the year!
It may be well to state here that the Black Bear, the Boy Scout
motorboat, was a specially constructed vessel, built by Harry's father
for river work. The materials were light yet strong, and the boat could
easily be taken apart and put together again when occasion required.
Between the cross-grained slices of tough wood of which the craft was
built were plates of steel, thus rendering the boat virtually bullet proof.
The Black Bear was constructed so that it could be almost entirely
thrown open to the sunshine when so desired or closed tightly against

cold or rain. The roof could be rolled up in a bundle in the middle like
the curtain of a modern desk. The sides were composed of oblong
panels which could be inserted in grooved steel uprights when it was
desired to close in the interior of the boat. The motors were very
powerful.
In fact, it was just such a boat as was needed on the trip the boys had in
mind. It had done excellent service on the Columbia, and nothing less
could be expected of it on the Amazon. The Wolf, which was merely a
tender, was watertight in construction, being shaped like a banana, and
was towed by the motor-boat. Here the extra stocks of gasoline,