Towards evening one of the women went about among her neighbors to tell the news she had heard.
"The man who rode at the head of the mule train is Dr. Hugh Tucker. He comes from North America. Tonight he is going to speak in the public square. There are many people who say that it is the book which he has that has made his country great and free."
In the evening a crowd came to the public square to hear Dr. Tucker. They asked him many questions. Some who had money, or who could read, bought Bibles so they could learn more for themselves of the things he told them. He gave Bibles to those who had no money.
Dr. Tucker's business was to give the Bible to the people of Brazil. For years that was what he had been doing. In the beautiful city of Rio de Janeiro he had a great store to which people came by the hundreds to buy Bibles and from which Bibles were sent by mail and by colporteurs in all directions.
These colporteurs, or Bible men, went through the cities of Brazil and far into the country. Sometimes they walked, sometimes they rode on mules, and sometimes they traveled in ox-carts. Dr. Tucker himself often rode with them, as he did on this trip when they stopped at Paracatu. This journey through towns and open country lasted for six weeks.
There were few houses along the rough and hilly roads. Now and then long-legged ostriches ran across the path before the mules. Gaily colored parrots perched on branches of the trees; monkeys chattered in the vines beside the small streams; and here and there a fox or a tatou ran past. Sometimes the prairie with its waving grass stretched before them like an ocean. At night they pitched their tent beside small streams where the grass grew fresh and green.
One Sunday morning as they rested in front of their tent, an ox-cart stopped before them, and a man jumped out and asked for a cup of coffee. As he drank the coffee, Dr. Tucker read to him from the Bible.
"Go on, go on," the man called to his driver. "I'll follow later. Never in all my life have I heard such strange things as this book tells."
The next morning the colporteurs were up at three o'clock. The moon lighted their way as they rode. They stopped at a house for breakfast, and Dr. Tucker took out a Bible and read from it to their host.
