"There was where father met his great misfortune," Ned went on, "in the shipping. The gold was all right, and the guard was all right, but father didn't know that it was customary to lash the box to two big timbers, so that if anything happened to the canoe the gold would float. The men didn't care, and they came down the Urubu all right into the Orinoco, and in five minutes more they'd have had the box aboard the steamer. But the swift current or something else struck the canoe; over she went, and down went the box like a flash, and it's never been seen since. The question is how far the current would carry it in that swift water, sixty feet deep, and how far it would sink in the muddy bottom. They have spent a good many hundred dollars in searching for it, but not a trace has ever been found, though that was several months ago, and the water is low enough now.
"So you see," he concluded, "what a grand thing it would be if we could find it on our way to join the folks. I wanted to try it sooner, but they would not let us start till I had finished my course at the School of Mines."
"It wouldn't belong to us if we did find it," Jack objected.
"No, nor to father either," Ned answered. "But they've offered two thousand dollars reward for its recovery, and if we could find it, it would smooth everything out. We've got to go past Potosi in a canoe anyhow. The steamer that starts to-morrow evening goes only to Bolivar, and there we are to buy a canoe and do the rest of the journey on our own hook. Then you'll have a chance to show what you're made of, young fellow, with a hundred and forty miles to paddle in a canoe."
"Don't brag, Mr. School of Mines," Jack laughed. "I guess when it comes to paddling you'll find I'm with you."
The young Americans were surprised to find that it was a good American steamboat that was to carry them up the Orinoco on Saturday evening—a boat called the Bolivar, of about 600 tons. They knew that it was only one section of the river they would see, for the Orinoco empties into the sea through a hundred mouths, some flowing into the Gulf of Paria, others emptying into the ocean as far down the coast as Point Barrima, 230 miles away. There was not much to be seen on Saturday evening, for the boat had a long sail across the Gulf of Paria before entering the river, down past San Fernando and the pitchy shores of La Brea, near the great pitch lake. When Sunday morning dawned they were in one of the many channels of the mighty Orinoco, and then there was even less to see than before. The river was nearly a mile wide, but the shores were low and covered with mangrove bushes, and there was no sign of life or habitation.
"Say, Ned," Jack exclaimed, after they had gone through scores of miles of this low wet country, "what do you think of Venezuela? It would be a funny racket if two great nations should go to war over the boundaries of a country like this."
"It's a matter of honor with us," Ned replied, still in his dignified way.
"A matter of chills, I should say, here along the coast," Jack retorted, "though it's hot enough to cook eggs in the sand. I don't think the thermometer went below 90° all last night."
All the way up to the City of Bolivar the river was much the same, except that occasionally they passed a bluff; and wherever there was a bluff there was a little settlement, the houses having no walls but the posts that supported the thatched roofs. Nowhere was there a sign of cultivation or any land that looked as if it could be cultivated, and the only human beings were the Guaranno Indians, who lived in the huts on shore. The river water was thick with yellow mud, and well spiced with alligators and giant lizards five or six feet long.