Publisher's Synopsis
The history of a South American revolution. But on this leading theme there hang such a multitude of side-issues and of individual experiences that it is certainly the hardest of Conrad's novels to summarize. In this story of vast riches, of unbridled passions, of patriotism, of greed, of barbaric cruelty, of the most debased and of the most noble impulses, the whole history of South America seems to be epitomized.