[Illustration: An Elderly Parent, in the temporary absence of his Affectionate son, begins a Cautious Stalk of a buck.]
[Illustration: Joyful Emotions of the Aff. son, and the Aff. Son’s followers, on witnessing the Cautious Stalk and preparing to take an Active Part in it.]
[Illustration: Arrival of Aff. Son; mixed emotions of Elderly Parent; buck in vanishing perspective.]
Before we started on the serious exploring part of the Brazilian trip, we paid visits to several fazendas or ranches in the state of Matto Grosso, with the purpose of hunting jaguar, as well as the lesser game of the country. One of the fazendas at which we stayed belonged to the governor of the state. When we were wakened before daylight to start off on the hunt we were given, in Brazilian fashion, the small cup of black coffee and piece of bread which constitutes the native Brazilian breakfast. We would then sally forth to return to the ranch not before noon, and sometimes much later, as the hunting luck dictated. We would find an enormous lunch waiting for us at the house. Father, who was accustomed to an American breakfast, remarked regretfully that he wished the lunch were divided, or that at least part of it were used to supplement the black coffee of daybreak. The second morning, as I went down the hall, the dining-room door was ajar, and I caught sight of the table laden with the cold meats and salads that were to serve as part of our elaborate luncheon many dim hours hence. I hurried back to tell father, and we tiptoed cautiously into the dining-room, closing the door noiselessly behind us. While we were engaged in making rapid despatch of a cold chicken, we heard our hosts calling, and the next minute the head of the house popped in the door! As father said afterward, we felt and looked like two small boys caught stealing jam in the pantry.
The Brazilian exploration was not so carefully planned as the African trip, because father had not intended to make much of an expedition. The first time he mentioned the idea was in April, 1913, in reply to a letter I wrote from São Paulo describing a short hunting expedition that I had made. “The forest must be lovely; some time I must get down to see you, and we’ll take a fortnight’s outing, and you shall hunt and I’ll act as what in the North Woods we used to call ‘Wangan man,’ and keep camp!”