In [[H. G. Wells]]' novel ''The History of Mr. Polly,'' the title character loves to read about exotic places. The Amazon was one place that captured his imagination, "but when he discovered that you could not see one bank from the other, he lost, through some mysterious action of the soul that again I cannot understand, at least a tithe of the pleasure he had taken in that river." | In [[H. G. Wells]]' novel ''The History of Mr. Polly,'' the title character loves to read about exotic places. The Amazon was one place that captured his imagination, "but when he discovered that you could not see one bank from the other, he lost, through some mysterious action of the soul that again I cannot understand, at least a tithe of the pleasure he had taken in that river." |