3. They are robbed of their crops, their women, and their children to satisfy the voracity, lasciviousness, and avarice of this company and its employees, who live on their food and violate their women. 4. They are sold wholesale and retail in Iquitos, at prices that range from £20 to £40 each. 5. They are flogged inhumanly until their bones are laid bare, and great raw sores cover them. 6. They are given no medical treatment, but are left to die, eaten by maggots, when they serve as food for the chiefs' dogs. 7. They are castrated and mutilated, and their ears, fingers, arms, and legs are cut off. 8. They are tortured by means of fire and water, and by tying them up, crucified head down. 9. Their houses and crops are burned and destroyed wantonly and for amusement. 10. They are cut to pieces and dismembered with knives, axes, and _machetes_. 11. Their children are grasped by the feet and their heads are dashed against trees and walls until their brains fly out. 12. Their old folk are killed when they are no longer able to work for the company. 13. Men, women, and children are shot to provide amusement for the employees or to celebrate the _sábado de gloria_, or, in preference to this, they are burned with kerosene so that the employees may enjoy their desperate agony. This is indeed a horrible indictment, and may seem incredible to many. On the other hand, we all know the inhuman atrocities of the Congo, and it seems reasonable to suppose that the conditions that have made that region so notorious do not fail to produce precisely similar results in the vast and isolated region of the Putumayo. In addition to this, during my subsequent investigations in Iquitos I obtained from a number of eye-witnesses accounts[97] of many of the abominable outrages that take place here hourly, and these, with my own observations, are the basis for the indictment. This state of affairs is intolerable. The region monopolised by this company is a living hell--a place where unbridled cruelty and its twin-brother, lust, run riot, with consequences too horrible to put down in writing. It is a blot on civilisation; and the reek of its abominations mounts to heaven in fumes of shame. Why is it not stopped? Peru will not, because this company is settling in and occupying the disputed territory in her name. Colombia and Ecuador cannot, for they are not in a condition to quarrel with Peru. And it is all for--what? Merely to fill the pockets and gratify the passions of a handful of miserable, half-breed outlaws, who take advantage of their autocratic authority over the helpless Huitotos to commit the most horrible and unheard-of crimes, and to keep others, who share the responsibility of these horrors, in luxury and fine clothes away off across the seas.