Yet this great republic has only had its borders touched. It is estimated that there are over a million Indians in the interior, who hold undisputed possession of four-fifths of the country. Three and a quarter million square miles of the republic thus remains to a great extent an unknown, unexplored wilderness. In this area there are over a million square miles of virgin forest, "the largest and densest on earth." The forest region of the Amazon is twelve hundred miles east to west, and eight hundred miles north to south, and this sombre, primeval woodland has not yet been crossed. [Footnote: Just as this goes to press the newspapers announce that the Brazilian Government has appropriated $10,000 towards the expenses of an expedition into the interior, under the leadership of Henry Savage Landor, the English explorer.] Brazil's federal capital, Rio de Janeiro, stands on the finest harbor of the world, in which float ships from all nations. Proudest among these crafts are the large Brazilian gunboats. "It is a curious anomaly," says the _Scientific American_, "that the most powerful Dreadnought afloat should belong to a South American republic, but it cannot be denied that the _Minas Geraes_ is entitled to that distinction." This is one of the vessels that mutinied in 1910. Brazil is a strange republic. Fanatical, where the Bible is burned in the public plaza whenever introduced, yet, where the most obscene prints are publicly offered for sale in the stores. Where it is a "mortal sin" to listen to the Protestant missionary, and _not_ a sin to break the whole Decalogue. Backward--where the villagers are tied to a post and whipped by the priest when they do not please him. Progressive--in the cities where religion has been relegated to women and children and priests.