prevailing indebtedness of the Barbados men was due. Another fruitful cause of debt was the unrestricted gambling that was openly carried on up to the period at which I visited the district. The employees at all the stations passed their time, when not hunting the Indians, either lying in their hammocks or in gambling. As there is no money in circulation, gambling debts can only be paid by writing an I O U, which the winner passes on to the chief agency at La Chorrera, where it is carried to the debit of the loser in the company's books. "The wild forest Indians of the Upper Amazon are very skilful builders with the materials that lie to their hands in their forest surroundings. Their own dwellings are very ably constructed. Several Indian families congregate together, all of them united by close ties of blood; and this assembly of relatives, called a tribe or 'nation,' may number anything from 20 to 150 human beings. In many cases such a tribe would live practically in one large dwelling-house. A clearing is made in the forest, and with the very straight trees that abound in the Amazon woods it is easy to obtain suitable timber for house-building. The uprights are as straight as the mast of a ship. The ridge-pole will often be from thirty to forty feet from the ground, and considerable skill is displayed in balancing the rough beams and adjusting the weight of the thatch. This thatch is composed of the dried and twisted fronds of a small swamp palm, which admirably excludes both rain and the rays of the sun. No tropical dwelling I have ever been in is so cool as one roofed with this material. The roofs or thatches of Indian houses extend right down to the ground. They are designed to keep out wet and sunlight, not to bar against intruders. They afford no protection against attack, and are not designed for defence, except against climatic conditions. The white settlers in the forest, from the first, compelled the Indians to build houses for them. The plan of the house would be the work of the white man, but the labour involved and all the materials would be supplied by the neighbouring Indian tribe or tribes he had reduced to work for him. All the houses that I visited outside the chief station of La Chorrera in which the company's agents lived, and where their goods were stored, were and are so constructed by the surrounding Indians, acting under the direct supervision of the agent and his white or half-caste employees. This labour of the Indians goes unremunerated. Not only do they build the houses and the stores for the white men, but they have to keep them in repair and supply labour for this purpose whenever called upon. The Indian in his native surroundings is satisfied with quite a small clearing in the forest around his own dwelling, but not so the white man who has come to live upon the Indian. These decree that their dwelling-houses shall stand in the midst of a very extensive