BOOKS OF THE DAY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3764, 4 May 1926, Page 78

BOOKS OF THE DAY.

BEVEN YEARS OF EXPLORATION. "•Head-hunters of the Amazon: Seven Years of Exploration and Adventure.” By F. W. Up de Graff, with ail introduction by R. B. Cunningliame Graham. (Cloth, Os net.) Australia: Cornstalk Publishing Company (per Angus and RobertBon, Limited). In a preface to this book the author explains that it is a collection of disjointed records published in. the belief that youthful, untamed spirits of the day will derive pleasure from the contemplation of the wanderings of one of tlieir predecessors, guided by an inscrutable fate. Its scene is laid in the little-known forests of the Upper Amazon basin. However that be, no “ youthful, untamed spirit ” will be ajile to resist its fascination and appeal, and whoever begins to read will bo compelled to finish it to the very end. In

comparison witli the ordinary book of travel “it is as a farthing dip to the noonday 6an. ,J Plough the author’s experiences amongst the head-hunters are undoubtedly the most griui and exciting he has to record there are others that are intensely interesting, too. For instance, there are those in which not men but animals figure—the loathsome but absolutely elusive vampire bat, or that monstrous reptile the anaconda. In addition to these there is the record of privations and hardships and sufferings borne wiith never-failing pluck throughout those seven strenuous years. It is one of the most graphic descriptions of the Upper Amazon country written, for the author tells us a great deal that our maps merely guess at, while his description of the flora and fauna of the Amazonian wilds is admirable. It would lie hard to imagine any novel furnishing more excitement and thyill.