Had Roosevelt been concerned about the trip he was about to take, he certainly would have hesitated to hire a man whose sole exploring experience had been in the Arctic—a region that had almost nothing in common with the Amazon—and who, while there, had led his men to a disaster of legendary proportions. But, given Zahm’s enthusiasm about Fiala, Roosevelt, almost in passing, agreed to hire him—not merely as an extra hand, but as the man in charge of equipping the entire expedition.
