The child is not content with being called John Smith. "José Maria Jesus Joáo dois Sanctos Sylva da Costa da Cunha" is his name; and he recites it, as I, in my boyhood's days, used to "say a piece" while standing on a chair. There is no school in the town. In Brazil, 84 per cent. of the entire population are illiterate. Corumbá contains a few stores of all descriptions, but it would seem that the stock in trade of the chemist is very low, for I overheard a conversation between two women one day, who said they could not get this or that--in fact, "he only keeps cures for stabs and such like things." In the _armazems_ liquors are sold, and rice, salt and beans despatched to the customer by the pint. Why wine and milk are not sold by the pound I did not enquire. One is not to ask too much in Brazil, or offence is given. When seated at table one day with a comrade, who had the misfortune to swallow a bone, I quietly "swallowed" the remedy a Brazilian told us of. He said their custom was for all to turn away their heads, while the unfortunate one revolved his plate around three times to the left, and presto! the bone disappeared. My friend did not believe in the cure; consequently, he suffered for several days. I have said that dogs are numerous. These animals roam the streets by day and night in packs and fight and tear at anyone or anything. Some days before we arrived there were even more, but a few pounds of poison had been scattered about the streets--which, by the way, are the worst of any town I have ever entered--and the dog population of the world decreased nine hundred. This is the Corumbá version. Perhaps the truth is, nine hundred feet, or, as we count, two hundred and twenty-five dogs. In the interests of humanity, I hope the number was nine hundred heads. Five carts then patrolled the streets and carried away to the outskirts those dead dogs, which were there burnt. I, the writer, find the latter part of the story hardest to believe. Why should a freeborn Brazilian lift dogs out of the street? In what better place could they be? They would fill up the holes and ruts, and, in such intense heat, why do needless work?