If the traveller still pines for new worlds to conquer, the Lage Iramos steamers will take him to the mouth of the mighty Amazon, known to every schoolboy as the largest river in the world, and destined to become more and more the great outlet for the trade of Brazil. The great estuary of that stream is like a huge inland sea debouching into the ocean, for it is not only the waters of the Amazon that are there discharged, but the effluents of a dozen tributaries, many of them larger than any river that Europe can boast. The trip up to Manáos, many miles inland, will be more than sufficient to impress the voyager with the magnitude and majesty of this noble stream. CHAPTER XXVI _São Paulo_ Unlike most of the State capitals of Brazil, São Paulo lies some distance inland, but in close touch with its port Santos, some thirty-five miles distant. Many passengers travelling by the Royal Mail steamers bound for the Argentine, disembark at Rio and take the train from the Central Railway Station across country to São Paulo, rejoining their steamer at Santos. This variation is not only a pleasant break in the voyage, but affords the opportunity for viewing the most thriving and prosperous city in South America. The journey by rail from Rio to São Paulo occupies about twelve hours in a sleeping or observation car, equalling if not excelling anything of the kind in Europe. The separate two-berth cabins provided with electric light and fans will be appreciated by the most experienced railway travellers accustomed to the latest improvements in the way of comfort. The first part of the journey is through a hilly country, with immense woods and thick undergrowth of tropical vegetation, covering the earth as with a vivid green mantle as far as the eye can reach. Numbers of curious trees with fantastically twisted stems reaching to a height of 100 to 150 feet tower above the dense masses of tangled foliage, tall palms of many varieties with fan-shaped leaves, and straight smooth trunks, grow side by side with dwarfed bushy shrubs, over which great banana leaves bend with their own weight, whilst magnificent flowers and orchids of brilliant colour peep out from the dark recesses of the woods, sparkling like jewels in a mass of lovely hair. As São Paulo is neared, the tropical luxuriance fades, and nature’s wild and prolific garden is replaced by the ordered arrangements of man’s industry, for this State is the best farmed as well as the most thickly populated in all Brazil. Its staple industry produces at least one half of all the coffee consumed in the world to-day, besides which its people gather large harvests of sugar, cotton, grapes, tobacco, and several kinds of cereals, principally rice and wheat. This agricultural prosperity is due to several causes: a kindly climate, a regular rainfall, a natural system of irrigation, and an increasingly industrious population from all parts of Europe.