LOST TRIBE

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 72, 22 September 1930, Page 17

LOST TRIBE

A DARING SEARCH

INTREPID GIRL'S PLANS

YEAE-LONG QUEST

(Copirriglit). On a raw, cold, rainy afternoon recently, the S.S. Western World carried away from Hobokeu ono of the most gallant explorers this world has ever known. , An American girl of 29 was sailing for Bio de.Janeiro, to start out from that Brazilian city on a trek into the interior of the jungles of Brazil, there to search for a tribe of Indians never yet seen by white man or woman. She is searching, alone, for tho same tribe hunted by Colonel Fawcett, in those jungles where tho explorer disappeared. But the general belief that Colonel Fawcett was probably killed by the Indians, whom she is planning •to study, does not keep Elizabeth Steen from her self-appointed task. - The Karaja Indians had made a raid on the primitive tribe, then living between the Tapirape and Xingu Kivers in the interior of Brazil. The invaders killed many of tho warriors and carried off with them one of the women of the tribe. Sho is still believed living with the Karaja tribe, as the wife of one of the warriors. After the battle between the rivers, the Tapirapes retreated farther into the interior. For twenty years no word has come from them. They' koep always just beyond the reach of explorers and of the other Indian tribes. It was to search for them that Colonel Faweett set out across the interior of. Brazil and disappeared from sight. EXPLORATION. Several years ago, Elizabeth Stcon went into tho interior of Brazil with another expedition. It did not penetrate as deeply into the continent as she is planning to go on this expedition of her own. It -was the regulation exploration trip, studying the habits of the head-hunting tribes of the jungle. It was while on this trip that the young woman from the West conceived the idea of starting -out on her own to find the lost tribe. As she stood on the deck of the Western World, waving good-bye to a group of college acquaintances aiid old friends of tho family from the. little town in lowa where she was born, Besr Steon could not help but realise tha: » may have"been waving farewell a- the last time to these friends and to her native land. Sho does not have any illusions about the dangers she is facing. "I know what I am getting into," she said, "I know that the chances are slim that I shall ever get back to civilisation , alive. But still I have a feeling that I will come through safely. Perhaps I am unduly optimistic, but I. believe that a lone woman will be able to get through the jungle where a large expedition will fail. The Indians of the jungles of Brazil have a profound respect for women. It is upon this that I am depending- to carry me through, and upon the fact that I will be travelling so light that there will be no temptation to rob me. These

junglo natives have always venerated woman; they make her almost their god. lam going into the interior of South America as a woman, am throwing myself upon their mercy and upon their kindness. i Instead of the usual, exploring clothes, Miss Steen is wearing a dress. True, she will have her riding costumo on underneath for convenience in working her way through the jungle, aud in the canoes along the Amazon. But over this she will wear a sort of apron of khaki. Her hair is long. Perhaps these feminine wiles will not work. Perhaps the Indian tribes which sho wishes to study will not give to a white woman the veneration they accord to the women of their own tribes. Elizabeth Sheen is willing to take a chance on this. The tribe which she is to look for in the junglo fastnesses is the Tapirape, an almost legendary tribe which keeps always just beyond the reach of the whito man. As expeditions press deeper and-deeper into the junglo, the tribe goes back toward tho hills, a tantalising bait for tbo ethnologist and the anthropologist. AWAY A YEAR She is going to travel right through the Matta Grosso junglo and up into the foothills. She has eliminated from her baggage everything which will not be absolutely necessary for tho year's stay, which she expects to make among the lost tribe. Down in Brazil she will pick up an Indian guide whom she has had engaged for a year. Deeper in tho interior she will bo met by a nogro maid who knows the Indian language. From Rio de Janeiro she will tako a train to Sao Paulo, and from there will go to the end of tho railway line. Then, by motor-truck and with bag find baggage, the girl explorer will rattlo over the primitive roads as far as there is any road at all to travel. At Guyaz she will have to bid farewell to the truck and go by foot across to the Araguaya Eiver. Dugouts and Indian paddlers will furnish conveyance down this river and along the Amazon. At tho mouth of tho Tapirape Eiver she will pick up her guide and her maid, and from then on they will be lost to civilisation. They will go by river as much as possible, and when this cannot be done they will start out across country with packs upon their backs to find a lost tribe and study its ways of living. Once this point is reached, Miss Stocn will be out of touch with the world she has loft behind. There will be no telegraph stations, no way of getting mail out to the coast, until she emerges a year from now with tho results of her expedition written down, she will not hear from any of her friends and they will not know what has become of her. There in the.interior of Brazil, she is hoping to find some trace of the lost Colonel Fawcett, some clue, some rumour that she can, bring back to America with her. Her equipment for this stay is of the simplest. She is taking along two' or three of her combination riding and apron costumes, made of cotton, so that they will stand the intense heat and moisture of the jungle. Then / she is carrying a silk tent in which sho will live. She has three guns with her—one of them a long range gun which can shoot three miles, for she will be surrounded by wild animals. In her,packs 'will be a large quantity of fish-hooks, the favourite currency of those tribes thero in the interior. Just before she left the West, her friends gave her a party. Bach one

brought as a present her old beads, and with these she is going to make presents of state to tho tribes which sho will visit. WITH A CAMERA. l'u her pack also is a small movie camera and a portable typewriter. She is planning to keep a record of her trip, to write down tho findings of her ethnological studies. When she once more reaches the outside world, if she ever does, the intrepid girl explorer will write a book about this lost tribe. She has been a student of ethnology and anthropology for some time. She has a master's degree from Columbia University, and has been taking graduate work in the University of California in her chosen subject. For years she has been studying the lives and habits of the Indian tribes, reading up what others have discovered, piecing this together with what sho learned on her last trip to Brazil. When she comes out next year -from the foothills of the interior mountains, Bessie Steen will have priceless records to give to the world. She will have accomplished alono what olaborate expeditions havo failed to do. Her moving pictures, her records of tho life there will bo infinitely valuable to science. Elizabeth Steen is facing an almost certain death with a smile. Jungle fever, starvation, poisoned arrows, a capsized boat on the rapids of an interior river, snakes —death could come in any number of guises, but she will not falter.