The next day was that of our departure. Before leaving, we rode with Mr.

Lage through his plantation, that we might understand something of the

process of coffee culture in this country. I am not sure that, in giving

an account of this model fazenda, we give a just idea of fazendas in

general. Its owner carries the same large and comprehensive spirit, the

same energy and force of will, into all his undertakings, and has

introduced extensive reforms on his plantations. The Fazenda da

Fortaleza de Santa Anna lies at the foot of the Serra da Babylonia. The

house itself, as I have already said, makes a part of a succession of

low white buildings, enclosing an oblong square divided into neat lots,

destined for the drying of coffee. This drying of the coffee in the

immediate vicinity of the house, though it seems a very general custom,

must be an uncomfortable one; for the drying-lots are laid down in a

dazzling white cement, from the glare of which, in this hot climate, the

eye turns wearily away, longing for a green spot on which to rest. Just

behind the house on the slope of the hill is the orangery. I am never

tired of these golden orchards, and this was one of especial beauty. The

small, deep-colored tangerines, sometimes twenty or thirty in one

cluster, the large, choice orange, “Laranja selecta,” as it is called,

often ten or twelve together in a single bunch, and bearing the branches

to the ground with their weight; the paler “Limaō dôce,” or sweet lemon,

rather insipid, but greatly esteemed here for its cool, refreshing

properties,—all these, with many others,—for the variety of oranges is

far greater than we of the temperate zone conceive it to be,—make a mass

of color in which gold, deep orange, and pale yellow are blended

wonderfully with the background of green. Beyond the house enclosure, on

the opposite side of the road, are the gardens, with aviary, and

fish-ponds in the centre. With these exceptions, all of the property

which is not forest is devoted to coffee, covering all the hillsides for

miles around. The seed is planted in nurseries especially prepared,

where it undergoes its first year’s growth. It is then transplanted to

its permanent home, and begins to bear in about three years, the first

crop being of course a very light one. From that time forward, under

good care and with favorable soil, it will continue to bear and even to

yield two crops or more annually, for thirty years in succession. At

that time the shrubs and the soil are alike exhausted, and, according to

the custom of the country, the fazendeiro cuts down a new forest and

begins a new plantation, completely abandoning his old one, without a

thought of redeeming or fertilizing the exhausted land. One of the

long-sighted reforms undertaken by our host is the manuring of all the

old, deserted plantations on his estate; he has already a number of

vigorous young plantations, which promise to be as good as if a virgin

forest had been sacrificed to produce them. He wishes not only to

preserve the wood on his own estate, and to show that agriculture need

not be cultivated at the expense of taste and beauty, but to remind his

country people also, that, extensive as are the forests, they will not

last forever, and that it will be necessary to emigrate before long to

find new coffee grounds, if the old ones are to be considered worthless.

Another of his reforms is that of the roads, already alluded to. The

ordinary roads in the coffee plantations, like the mule-tracks all over

the country, are carried straight up the sides of the hills between the

lines of shrubs, gullied by every rain, and offering, besides, so steep

an ascent that even with eight or ten oxen it is often impossible to

drive the clumsy, old-fashioned carts up the slope, and the negroes are

obliged to bring a great part of the harvest down on their heads. An

American, who has been a great deal on the coffee fazendas in this

region, told me that he had seen negroes bringing enormous burdens of

this kind on their heads down almost vertical slopes. On Senhor Lage’s

estate all these old roads are abandoned, except where they are planted

here and there with alleys of orange-trees for the use of the negroes,

and he has substituted for them winding roads in the side of the hill

with a very gradual ascent, so that light carts dragged by a single mule

can transport all the harvest from the summit of the plantation to the

drying-ground. It was the harvesting season, and the spectacle was a

pretty one. The negroes, men and women, were scattered about the

plantations with broad, shallow trays, made of plaited grass or bamboo,

strapped over their shoulders and supported at their waists; into these

they were gathering the coffee, some of the berries being brilliantly

red, some already beginning to dry and turn brown, while here and there

was a green one not yet quite ripe, but soon to ripen in the scorching

sun. Little black children were sitting on the ground and gathering what

fell under the bushes, singing at their work a monotonous but rather

pretty snatch of song in which some took the first and others the

second, making a not inharmonious music. As their baskets were filled

they came to the Administrador to receive a little metal ticket on which

the amount of their work was marked. A task is allotted to each one,—so

much to a full-grown man, so much to a woman with young children, so

much to a child,—and each one is paid for whatever he may do over and

above it. The requisition is a very moderate one, so that the

industrious have an opportunity of making a little money independently.

At night they all present their tickets and are paid on the spot for any

extra work. From the harvesting-ground we followed the carts down to the

place where their burden is deposited. On their return from the

plantation the negroes divide the day’s harvest, and dispose it in

little mounds on the drying-ground. When pretty equally dried, the

coffee is spread out in thin even layers over the whole enclosure, where

it is baked for the last time. It is then hulled by a very simple

machine in use on almost all the fazendas, and the process is complete.

At noon we bade good by to our kind hosts, and started for Juiz de Fora.

Our stage was not a bad imitation of Noah’s ark, for we carried with us

the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the fishes from the

waters,[41] to say nothing of the trees from the forest. The party with

whom we had passed such pleasant days collected to bid us farewell, and

followed us, as we passed out from the gate, with vivas and waving hats

and handkerchiefs.

The following day we were fortunate in having cool weather with a

somewhat cloudy sky, so that our ride of ten hours from Juiz de Fora to

Petropolis, on the top of the stage, was delightful. The next morning in

driving down the Serra to Mauá we witnessed a singular phenomenon,

common enough, I suppose, to those who live in high regions. As we

turned the corner of the road which first brings us in sight of the

magnificent view below the Serra, there was a general exclamation of

surprise and admiration. The valley and harbor, quite out to the sea,

were changed to a field of snow, white, soft, and fleecy, as if fallen

that night. The illusion was perfect, and though recognized at once as

simply an effect of the heavy morning fog, we could hardly believe that

it would disperse at our approach and not prove to be the thing it

seemed. Here and there the summit of a hill pierced through it like an

island, making the deception more complete. The incident was especially

interesting to us as connecting itself with our late discussions as to

the possible former existence of glaciers in this region. In his lecture

a few nights before, describing the greater extension of the ice in

former geological ages, when the whole plain of Switzerland between the

Alps and Jura must have been filled with glaciers, Mr. Agassiz had said

“there is a phenomenon not uncommon in the autumn in Switzerland which

may help us to reconstruct this wonderful picture. Sometimes in a

September morning the whole plain of Switzerland is filled with vapor

which, when its pure white, undulating surface is seen from the higher

summits of the Jura, looks like a snowy ‘mer de glace,’ appearing to

descend from the peaks of the Alps and extending toward the Jura, while

from all the tributary valleys similar masses pour down to meet it.” It

was as if the valley and harbor of Rio had meant to offer us a similar

picture of past times, with the image of which our minds had been filled

for the last few days in consequence of the glacial phenomena constantly

presented to us on our journey.

_July 6th._—To-morrow was to have been the day of our departure for the

Amazons, but private interests must yield to public good, and it seems

that the steamer which was to have left for Pará to-morrow has been

taken by the government to transport troops to the seat of war. The

aspect of the war grows daily more serious, and the Emperor goes himself

the day after to-morrow to Rio Grande do Sul, accompanied by his

son-in-law, the Duke of Saxe, soon to be followed by the Conte d’Eu, who

is expected by the French steamer of the 18th of this month. Under these

circumstances, not only are we prevented from going at the appointed

date, but it seems not improbable that the exigencies of war may cause a

still further delay, should other steamers be needed. A very pleasant

public dinner, intended to be on the eve of his departure, was given to

Mr. Agassiz yesterday by Messrs. Fleiuss and Linde. Germans, Swiss,

French, Americans, and Brazilians made up the company, a mingling of

nationalities which resulted in a very general harmony.

_July 9th._—For some time Mr. Agassiz has been trying to get living

specimens of the insect so injurious to the coffee-tree; the larva of a

little moth akin to those which destroy the vineyards in Europe.

Yesterday he succeeded in obtaining some, and among them one just

spinning his cocoon on the leaf. We watched him for a long time with the

lens as he wove his filmy tent. He had arched the threads upwards in the

centre, so as to leave a little hollow space into which he could

withdraw; this tiny vault seemed to be completed at the moment we saw

him, and he was drawing threads forward and fastening them at a short

distance beyond, thus lashing his house to the leaf as it were. The

exquisite accuracy of the work was amazing. He was spinning the thread

with his mouth, and with every new stitch he turned his body backward,

attached his thread to the same spot, then drew it forward and fastened

it exactly on a line with the last, with a precision and rapidity that

machinery could hardly imitate. It is a curious question how far this

perfection of workmanship in many of the lower animals is simply

identical with their organization, and therefore to be considered a

function, as inevitable in its action as digestion or respiration,

rather than an instinct. In this case the body of the little animal was

his measure: it was amazing to see him lay down his threads with such

accuracy, till one remembered that he could not make them longer or

shorter; for, starting from the centre of his house, and stretching his

body its full length, they must always reach the same point. The same is

true of the so-called mathematics of the bee. The bees stand as close as

they can together in their hive for economy of space, and each one

deposits his wax around him, his own form and size being the mould for

the cells, the regularity of which when completed excites so much wonder

and admiration. The mathematical secret of the bee is to be found in his

structure, not in his instinct. But in the industrial work of some of

the lower animals, the ant for instance, there is a power of adaptation

which is not susceptible of the same explanation. Their social

organization, too intelligent, it seems, to be the work of any reasoning

powers of their own, yet does not appear to be directly connected with

their structure. While we were watching our little insect, a breath

stirred the leaf and he instantly contracted himself and drew back under

his roof; but presently came out again and returned to his work.

_July 14th._—I have passed two or three days of this week very

pleasantly with a party of friends who invited me to join them on a

visit to one of the largest fazendas in this neighborhood, belonging to

the Commendador Breves. A journey of some four hours on the Dom Pedro

Railroad brought us to the “Barra do Pirahy,” and thence we proceeded on

mule-back, riding slowly along the banks of the Parahyba through very

pleasant, quiet scenery, though much less picturesque than that in the

immediate vicinity of Rio. At about sunset we reached the fazenda,

standing on a terrace just above the river, and commanding a lovely view

of water and woodland. We were received with a hospitality hardly to be

equalled, I think, out of Brazil, for it asks neither who you are nor

whence you come, but opens its doors to every wayfarer. On this occasion

we were expected; but it is nevertheless true that at such a fazenda,

where the dining-room accommodates a hundred persons if necessary, all

travellers passing through the country are free to stop for rest and

refreshment. At the time of our visit there were several such transient

guests; among others a couple quite unknown to our hosts, who had

stopped for the night, but had been taken ill and detained there several

days. They seemed entirely at home. On this estate there are about two

thousand slaves, thirty of whom are house-servants; it includes within

its own borders all that would be required by such a population in the

way of supplies: it has its drug-shop and its hospital; its kitchens for

the service of the guests and for that of the numerous indoor servants,

its church, its priest, and its doctor. Here the church was made by

throwing open a small oratory, very handsomely fitted up with gold and

silver service, purple altar-cloth, &c., at the end of a very long room,

which, though used for other purposes, serves on such an occasion to

collect the large household together. The next morning our hostess

showed us the different working-rooms. One of the most interesting was

that where the children were taught to sew. I have wondered, on our

Southern plantations, that more pains was not taken to make clever

seamstresses of the women. Here plain sewing is taught to all the little

girls, and many of them are quite expert in embroidery and lace-making.

Beyond this room was a storeroom for clothing, looking not unlike one of

our sanitary rooms, with heaps of woollen and cotton stuffs which the

black women were cutting out and making up for the field hands. The

kitchens, with the working and lodging rooms of the house negroes,

enclosed a court planted with trees and shrubs, around which extended

covered brick walks where blacks, young and old, seemed to swarm, from

the withered woman who boasted herself a hundred, but was still proud to

display her fine lace-work, and ran like a girl, to show us how

sprightly she was, to the naked baby creeping at her feet. The old woman

had received her liberty some time ago, but seemed to be very much

attached to the family and never to have thought of leaving them. These

are the things which make one hopeful about slavery in Brazil;

emancipation is considered there a subject to be discussed, legislated

upon, adopted ultimately, and it seems no uncommon act to present a

slave with his liberty. In the evening, while taking coffee on the

terrace after dinner, we had very good music from a brass-band composed

of slaves belonging to the estate. The love of the negroes for music is

always remarkable, and here they take pains to cultivate it. Senhor

Breves keeps a teacher for them, and they are really very well trained.

At a later hour we had the band in the house and a dance by the black

children which was comical in the extreme. Like little imps of darkness

they looked, dancing with a rapidity of movement and gleeful enjoyment

with which one could not but sympathize. While the music was going on,

every door and window was filled with a cloud of dusky faces, now and

then a fair one among them; for here, as elsewhere, slavery brings its

inevitable and heaviest curse, and white slaves are by no means

uncommon. The next morning we left the fazenda, not on mule-back,

however, but in one of the flat-bottomed coffee-boats, an agreeable

exchange for the long, hot ride. We were accompanied to the landing by

our kind hosts, and followed by quite a train of blacks, some of them

bringing the baggage, others coming only for the amusement of seeing us

off. Among them was the old black woman who gave us the heartiest cheers

of all, as we put off from the shore. The sail down the river was very

pleasant; the coffee-bags served as cushions, and, with all our

umbrellas raised to make an awning, we contrived to shelter ourselves

from the sun. Neither was the journey without excitement, the river

being so broken by rocks in many places that there are strong rapids,

requiring a skilful navigation.

_July 15th._—A long botanizing excursion to-day among the Tijuca hills

with Mr. Glaziou, director of the Passeio Publico, as guide. It has been

a piece of the good fortune attending Mr. Agassiz thus far on this

expedition to find in Mr. Glaziou a botanist whose practical familiarity

with tropical plants is as thorough as his theoretical knowledge. He has

undertaken to enrich our scientific stores with a large collection of

such palms and other trees as illustrate the relation between the

present tropical vegetation and the ancient geological forests. Such a

collection will be invaluable as a basis for palæontological studies at

the Museum of Comparative Zoölogy in Cambridge.

_July 23d._—At last our plans for the Amazons seem definitely settled.

We sail the day after to-morrow by the Cruzeiro do Sul. The conduct of

the government toward the expedition is very generous; free passages are

granted to the whole party, and yesterday Mr. Agassiz received an

official document enjoining all persons connected with the

administration to give him every facility for his scientific objects. We

have another piece of good fortune in the addition to our party of Major

Coutinho, a member of the government corps of engineers, who has been

engaged for several years in explorations on the Amazonian rivers.

Happily for us, he returned to Rio a few weeks ago, and a chance meeting

at the palace, where he had gone to report the results of the journey

just completed, and Mr. Agassiz to discuss the plans for that about to

begin, brought them together. This young officer’s investigations had

made his name familiar to Mr. Agassiz, and when the Emperor asked the

latter how he could best assist him, he answered that there was nothing

he so much desired or which would so materially aid him as the

companionship of Major Coutinho. The Emperor cordially consented, Major

Coutinho signified his readiness, and the matter was concluded. Since

then there have been frequent conferences between Mr. Agassiz and his

new colleague, intent study of maps and endless talk about the most

desirable mode of laying out and dividing the work. He feels that Major

Coutinho’s familiarity with the scenes to which we are going will

lighten his task of half its difficulties, while his, scientific zeal

will make him a most sympathetic companion.[42] We found to-day some

large leaves of the Terminalia Catappa of the most brilliant colors; red

and gold as bright as any of our autumnal leaves. This would seem to

confirm the opinion that the turning of the foliage with us is not an

effect of frost, but simply the ripening of the leaf; since here, where

there is no frost, the same phenomenon takes place as in our northern

latitudes.

_July 24th._—Our last preparations for the journey are completed; the

collections made since our arrival, amounting to upwards of fifty

barrels and cases, are packed, in readiness for the first opportunity

which occurs for the United States, and to-morrow morning we shall be on

our way to the great river. We went this morning to the Collegio Dom

Pedro Segundo to bid farewell to our excellent friend Dr. Pacheco, to

whose kindness we owe much of our enjoyment during our stay here. The

College building was once a “seminario,” a charitable institution where

boys were taken to be educated as priests. The rules of the

establishment were strict; no servants were kept, the pupils were

obliged to do their own work, cooking, &c., and even to go out into the

streets to beg after the fashion of the mendicant orders. One condition

only was attached to the entrance of the children, namely, that they

should be of pure race; no mulattoes or negroes were admitted. I do not

know on what ground this institution was broken up by the government and

the building taken as a school-house. It has still a slightly monastic

aspect, though it has been greatly modified; but the cloisters running

around closed courts remind one of its origin. The recitations were

going on at the moment of our visit, and as we had seen nothing as yet

of the schools, Dr. Pacheco took us through the establishment. A college

here does not signify a university as with us, but rather a high school,

the age of the pupils being from twelve to eighteen. It is difficult to

judge of methods of education in a foreign language with which one is

not very familiar. But the scholars appeared bright and interested,

their answers came promptly, their discipline was evidently good. One

thing was very striking to a stranger in seeing so many young people

collected together; namely, the absence of pure type and the feeble

physique. I do not know whether it is in consequence of the climate, but

a healthy, vigorous child is a rare sight in Rio de Janeiro. The

scholars were of all colors, from black through intermediate shades to

white, and even one of the teachers having the direction of a higher

class in Latin was a negro. It is an evidence of the absence of any

prejudice against the blacks, that, on the occasion of a recent vacancy

among the Latin professors, this man, having passed the best

examination, was unanimously chosen in preference to several Brazilians,

of European descent, who presented themselves as candidates at the same

time. After hearing several of the classes we went over the rest of the

building. The order and exquisite neatness of the whole establishment,

not forgetting the kitchen, where the shining brasses and bright tins

might awaken the envy of many a housekeeper, bear testimony to the

excellence of the general direction. Since the institution passed into

Dr. Pacheco’s hands he has done a great deal to raise its character. He

has improved the library, purchased instruments for the laboratory, and

made many judicious changes in the general arrangement.

-----

Footnote 32:

Mr. Agassiz was prevented from making this excursion.

Footnote 33:

Though a resident of the United States for nearly twenty years, Mr.

Agassiz was only naturalized in 1863. At the moment when a general

distrust of our institutions prevailed in Europe, it was a

satisfaction to him to testify by some personal and public act his

confidence in them.

Footnote 34:

A short account of these explorations may be found at the end of the

volume.—L. A.

Footnote 35:

I am particularly indebted to Senator Th. Ottoni, Baron de Prados,

Senator Pompeo, Senator Paranagua, Senhor Paula Souza, and Senhor J.

B. da Fonseca, for information, maps, and other documents relative to

the regions intended to be explored by my young friends and myself.—L.

A.

Footnote 36:

Since it was reported in the newspapers that the proceeds of these

lectures were devoted to the expedition, it may be well to mention

here that they were free, given simply at the request of the Emperor,

and open to all without charge.

Footnote 37:

Mr. Agassiz was indebted to Senhor Machado for a valuable series of

photographs and stereoscopic views of this region, begun on this

excursion and completed during our absence in the North of Brazil.

Footnote 38:

The most complete account of these curious animals is to be found in

Bates’s “Naturalist on the Amazons.”

Footnote 39:

I was especially interested in examining the vegetable productions of

a little lake, hardly larger than a mill-pond, near this fazenda. It

was strange to see Potamogeton and Myriophyllum, plants which we

associate exclusively with the fresh waters of the temperate zone,

growing in the shadow of tropical forests where monkeys have their

home. Such combinations are very puzzling to the student of the laws

of geographical distribution.—L. A.

Footnote 40:

In the same way, it may be said that in its incipient growth the

Dicotyledonous Plant exhibits, in the structure of its germinative

leaves, the characteristic features of Monocotyledonous Plants.—L. A.

Footnote 41:

Senhor Lage had caused an extensive collection of fishes to be

gathered from the waters of the Rio Novo, so that this excursion

greatly extended the range of my survey of the basin of the

Parahyba.—L. A.

Footnote 42:

Never were pleasant anticipations more delightfully fulfilled. During

eleven months of the most intimate companionship I had daily cause to

be grateful for the chance which had thrown us together. I found in

Major Coutinho an able collaborator, untiring in his activity and

devotion to scientific aims, an admirable guide, and a friend whose

regard I trust I shall ever retain.—L. A.

CHAPTER IV.

VOYAGE UP THE COAST TO PARÁ.

ON BOARD THE “CRUZEIRO DO SUL.”—MEMBERS OF THE PARTY.—ARRIVAL

AT BAHIA.—DAY IN THE COUNTRY.—RETURN TO THE

STEAMER.—CONVERSATION ABOUT SLAVERY IN BRAZIL.—NEGRO

MARRIAGES.—MACEIO.—PERNAMBUCO.—PARAHYBA DO NORTE.—RAMBLE ON

SHORE.—CEARÁ.—DIFFICULT LANDING.—BRAZILIAN

BATHS.—MARANHAM.—ASSAI PALM.—VISIT TO ORPHAN

ASYLUM.—DETAINED IN PORT.—VARIETY OF MEDUSÆ.—ARRIVAL OF

AMERICAN GUNBOAT.—MORE MEDUSÆ.—DINNER ON SHORE.—CORDIALITY

TOWARD THE EXPEDITION.—ARRIVAL AT PARÁ.—KIND

RECEPTION.—ENVIRONS OF PARÁ.—LUXURIANT

GROWTH.—MARKETS.—INDIAN BOATS.—AGREEABLE CLIMATE.—EXCURSION

IN THE HARBOR.—CURIOUS MUSHROOM.—SUCCESS IN COLLECTING, WITH

THE ASSISTANCE OF OUR HOST AND OTHER FRIENDS.—FISHES OF THE

FORESTS.—PUBLIC EXPRESSIONS OF SYMPATHY FOR THE

EXPEDITION.—GENEROSITY OF THE AMAZONIAN STEAMSHIP

COMPANY.—GEOLOGICAL CHARACTER OF THE SHORE FROM RIO TO

PARÁ.—ERRATIC DRIFT.—LETTER TO THE EMPEROR.

_July 25th._—On board the “Cruzeiro do Sul.” We sailed to-day at 11

o’clock, bidding good by with regret, though not without hope of return,

to the beautiful bay and mountains on which we have been looking for

three months. Our party consists of Major Coutinho, Mr. Burkhardt,

Monsieur Bourget, who accompanies Mr. Agassiz to the Amazons as

collector and preparator, our two young friends Mr. Hunnewell and Mr.

James, and ourselves. At Bahia we shall be joined by Mr. Dexter and Mr.

Thayer, two of our party who have preceded us up the coast, and have

been collecting in the neighborhood of Bahia for two or three weeks. The

aspect of the steamer is not very inviting, for it has been used of late

for the transportation of troops to the south, in consequence of which

it is very dirty; it is also overcrowded on account of the number of

persons bound northward, who have been detained in Rio by the

interruption of the regular trips on this line. We are promised better

accommodations after a few days, however, as many of the passengers will

drop off at Bahia and Pernambuco.

_July 28th._—Bahia. Half the enjoyment of life borrows intensity from

contrast, and to this principle we certainly owe a part of our pleasure

to-day. After three half sea-sick days on a dirty, crowded steamer, the

change is delightful to a breezy country house, where we are received

with that most gracious hospitality which relieves both host and guests

of the sense of entertaining or being entertained. Here I have been

sitting under the deep shade of a huge mango-tree, with a number of the

“Revue des Deux Mondes” on my knee, either reading or listening lazily

to the rustle of the leaves or the cooing of the pigeons as they patter

up and down on the tiled floor of the porch near by, or watching the

negroes as they come and go with trays of vegetables or baskets of fruit

and flowers on their heads, for the service of the house. In the mean

time, Mr. Agassiz is engaged in examining the collections made by Mr.

Dexter and Mr. Thayer during their visit here. They have been aided most

cordially by our friend Mr. Antonio de Lacerda, at whose hospitable

house we are staying, and where we found our travelling companions quite

domesticated. He received them on their arrival, and has given them

every facility during their stay here for the objects they had in view,

his own love of natural history, to which he devotes every spare hour

from his active business life, rendering him an efficient ally. He has a

large and very valuable collection of insects, admirably arranged and in

excellent preservation. They are also greatly indebted to Mr. Nicolai,

the resident English clergyman here, who has accompanied them on some of

their excursions, and put them in the way of seeing whatever was most

interesting in the neighborhood.

On arriving in South America one should land first in Bahia, for in its

aspect it is the most national and characteristic of the cities. As we

passed directly through the town this morning, we can give but little

account of it, and yet we saw enough to confirm all that has been said

of its quaint and picturesque character. On first disembarking, you find

yourself at the foot of an almost perpendicular hill, and negro-bearers

appear at your side to carry you up the steep ascent, almost impassable

for carriages, in a “cadeira,” or curtained chair. This is in itself an

odd experience for one to whom it is new, and the rest of the city, with

its precipitous streets, its queer houses, its old churches, is as

quaint and antique as these original carriages.

_July 29th._—To-day we have the “revers de la médaille”; we have

returned to our prison, and a violent rain drives us all to take refuge

in the hot, close dining-room, our only resort when the weather is bad.

_July 30th._—Off Maceió. Last evening, when the rain was over and the

moonlight tempted every one on deck, we had a long conversation with our

pleasant travelling companion, Mr. Sinimbu, senator from the province of

Alagôas, on the aspect of slavery in Brazil. It seems to me that we may

have something to learn here in our own perplexities respecting the

position of the black race among us, for the Brazilians are trying

gradually and by installments some of the experiments which are forced

upon us without previous preparation. The absence of all restraint upon

the free blacks, the fact that they are eligible to office, and that all

professional careers are open to them, without prejudice on the ground

of color, enables one to form some opinion as to their ability and

capacity for development. Mr. Sinimbu tells us that here the result is

on the whole in their favor; he says that the free blacks compare well

in intelligence and activity with the Brazilians and Portuguese. But it

must be remembered, in making the comparison with reference to our own

country, that here they are brought into contact with a less energetic

and powerful race than the Anglo-Saxon. Mr. Sinimbu believes that

emancipation is to be accomplished in Brazil by a gradual process which

has already begun. A large number of slaves are freed every year by the

wills of their masters; a still larger number buy their own freedom

annually; and as there is no longer any importation of blacks, the

inevitable result of this must be the natural death of slavery.

Unhappily, the process is a slow one, and in the mean while slavery is

doing its evil work, debasing and enfeebling alike whites and blacks.

The Brazilians themselves do not deny this, and one constantly hears

them lament the necessity of sending their children away to be educated,

on account of the injurious association with the house-servants. In

fact, although politically slavery has a more hopeful aspect here than

elsewhere, the institution from a moral point of view has some of its

most revolting characters in this country, and looks, if possible, more

odious than it did in the States. The other day, in the neighborhood of

Rio, I had an opportunity of seeing a marriage between two negroes,

whose owner made the religious, or, as it appeared to me on this

occasion, irreligious ceremony, obligatory. The bride, who was as black

as jet, was dressed in white muslin, with a veil of coarse white lace,

such as the negro women make themselves, and the husband was in a white

linen suit. She looked, and I think she really felt, diffident, for

there were a good many strangers present, and her position was

embarrassing. The Portuguese priest, a bold, insolent-looking man,

called them up and rattled over the marriage service with most

irreverent speed, stopping now and then to scold them both, but

especially the woman, because she did not speak loud enough and did not

take the whole thing in the same coarse, rough way that he did. When he

ordered them to come up and kneel at the altar, his tone was more

suggestive of cursing than praying, and having uttered his blessing he

hurled an amen at them, slammed the prayer-book down on the altar,

whiffed out the candles, and turned the bride and bridegroom out of the

chapel with as little ceremony as one would have kicked out a dog. As

the bride came out, half crying, half smiling, her mother met her and

showered her with rose-leaves, and so this act of consecration, in which

the mother’s benediction seemed the only grace, was over. I thought what

a strange confusion there must be in these poor creature’s minds, if

they thought about it at all. They are told that the relation between

man and wife is a sin, unless confirmed by the sacred rite of marriage;

they come to hear a bad man gabble over them words which they cannot

understand, mingled with taunts and abuse which they understand only too

well, and side by side with their own children grow up the little

fair-skinned slaves to tell them practically that the white man does not

keep himself the law he imposes on them. What a monstrous lie the whole

system must seem to them if they are ever led to think about it at all.

I am far from supposing that the instance I have given should be taken

as representing the state of religious instruction on plantations

generally. No doubt there are good priests who improve and instruct

their black parishioners; but it does not follow because religious

services are provided on a plantation, the ceremony of marriage

observed, &c., that there is anything which deserves the name of

religious instruction. It would be unjust not to add the better side of

the question in this particular instance. The man was free, and I was

told that the woman received her liberty and a piece of land from her

master as her marriage dower.

We arrived at Maceió this morning, and went on shore with Mr. Sinimbu,

who leaves us here, and with whose family we passed a delightful day,

welcomed with that hearty cordiality so characteristic of Brazilians in

their own homes. Although our stay was so short, a considerable addition

was made here to the collections. On arriving at any port the party

disperses at once, the young men going in different directions to

collect, Mr. Bourget hurrying to the fish-market to see what may be

found there of interest, and Mr. Agassiz and Mr. Coutinho generally

making a geological excursion. In this way, though the steamer remains

but a few hours at each station, the time is not lost.

_July 31st._—Pernambuco. Arrived to-day off Pernambuco, and were too

happy, after a stormy night, to find ourselves behind the famous reef

which makes such a quiet harbor at this port. Our countryman, Mr. Hitch,

met us on landing, and drove us at once out to his “chacara,” (country

place,) where it was delightful to be welcomed, like old friends, to an

American home.[43] Pernambuco is by no means so picturesque as Bahia or

Rio de Janeiro. It has a more modern air than either of these, but looks

also more cleanly and more prosperous. Many of the streets are wide, and

the river running through the business part of the city, crossed by

broad, handsome bridges, is itself suggestive of freshness. The country

is more open and flat than farther south. In our afternoon drive some of

the views across wide, level meadows, if we could have put elms here and

there in the place of palms, would have reminded us of scenery at home.

_August 2d._—Yesterday we left Pernambuco, and this morning found

ourselves at the mouth of the Parahyba do Norte, a broad, beautiful

river, up which we steamed to within a few miles of the little town

bearing the same name. Here we took a boat and rowed to the city, where

we spent some hours in rambling about, collecting specimens, examining

drift formations, &c. In the course of our excursion we fell in with

some friends of Major Coutinho’s, who took us home with them to an

excellent breakfast of fresh fish, with bread, coffee, and wine. The

bread is to be noticed here, for it is said to be the best in Brazil.

The flour is the same as elsewhere, and the people generally attribute

the superiority of their bread to some quality of the water. Whatever be

the cause, there is no bread in all Brazil so sweet, so light, and so

white as that of Parahyba do Norte.

_August 5th._—We arrived yesterday at Ceará, where we were warmly

welcomed and most hospitably entertained at the house of Dr. Mendes, an

old acquaintance of Major Coutinho. It was blowing hard and raining when

we left the steamer; our boat put into the beach in a heavy surf, and I

was wondering how I should reach the shore, when two of our negro rowers

jumped into the water, and, standing at the side of the boat behind me,

motioned me to come, crossing their arms basket-fashion, as we do

sometimes to carry children. They looked as if it were the ordinary mode

of conveyance, so I seated myself, and with one arm around the neck of

each of my black bearers, they laughing as heartily as I did, I was

landed triumphantly on the sands. After the first greetings at the house

of Dr. Mendes were over, we were offered the luxury of a bath before

breakfast. The bath is a very important feature in a Brazilian

household. This one was of the size of a small room, the water (about

two feet deep and of a delicious, soft, velvety character) constantly

flowing through over the smooth sand floor. They are often larger than

this, from four to five feet deep, and sometimes lined with blue and

white tiles, which make a very clean and pretty floor. It is a great

luxury in this warm climate, and many persons bathe several times a day.

The bathhouse is usually in the garden, at a convenient distance from

the house, but not immediately adjoining it. The bath was followed by an

excellent breakfast, after which we drove through the city. Ceará is a

wonderfully progressive town for Brazil. Five years ago it had not a

paved street; now all the streets are well paved, with good sidewalks,

and the city is very carefully laid out, with a view to its future

growth.[44] To-day we are again coasting along within sight of land,

with a quiet sea and a delicious breeze. The ocean is covered with white

caps, and of a very peculiar greenish, aquamarine tint, the same which I

observed as soon as we reached these latitudes in coming out. This

singular color is said to be owing to the nature of the sea bottom and

the shallowness of the water, combined, farther north, with the

admixture of fresh water along the coast.

_August 6th._—Arrived early this morning before Maranham, and went on

shore to breakfast at the hotel; for, wonderful to relate, Maranham

possesses a hotel, a great rarity in many Brazilian towns. We passed the

greater part of the day in driving about the city with Dr. Braga, who

kindly undertook to show us everything of interest.[45] The town and

harbor are very pretty, the city itself standing on an island, formed by

two bays running up on either side and enclosing it. The surrounding

country is flat and very thickly wooded, though the woods are rather

low. Here, at the house of Dr. Braga’s brother-in-law, we saw, for the

first time, the slender, graceful Assai palm, from which the drink is

made so much appreciated in Pará and on the Lower Amazons. It is curious

to see the negroes go up the tree to gather the fruit. The trunk is

perfectly smooth, the fruit growing in a heavy cluster of berries, just

below the crown of leaves on its summit. The negro fastens a cord or a

strip of palm-leaf around his insteps, thus binding his feet together

that they may not slide apart on the smooth stem, and by means of this

kind of stirrup he contrives to cling to the slippery trunk and scramble

up.

We were much interested in seeing here an admirably well conducted

institution for the education of poor orphans. Its chief aim is to

educate them, not as scholars, though they receive elementary

instruction in reading, writing, and ciphering, but to teach them a

variety of occupations by which they can earn an honest livelihood. They

are trained in several trades, are taught to play on a number of

instruments, and there is also a school of design connected with the

establishment. A faultless order and scrupulous neatness prevailed

through the whole building, which was not the result of an exceptional

preparation, since our visit was wholly unexpected. This surprised us

the more, because, notwithstanding their fondness for bathing, order and

neatness in their houses are not a virtue among the Brazilians. This may

be owing to slave labor,—rarely anything better than eye-service. The

large dormitories looked fresh and airy, with the hammocks rolled up and

laid on a shelf, each one above the peg to which it belonged; the shoes

were hung on nails along the walls, and the little trunks, holding the

clothing of each scholar, were neatly arranged beneath them. On the

upper story was the hospital, a large, well-ventilated room, with

numerous windows commanding beautiful views, and a cool breeze blowing

through it. Here were cots instead of hammocks, but I thought the sick

boys might prefer the swinging, cradle-like beds to which they were

accustomed, and which they evidently find very comfortable. When Mr.

Agassiz remarked, as we passed through the dormitory, that sleeping in a

hammock was an experience he had yet to make, one of the boys took his

down from the shelf, and, hanging it up, laughingly threw himself into

it, with a lazy ease which looked quite enviable. The kitchen and

grocery rooms were as neat as the rest of the house, and the simplicity

of the whole establishment, while it admitted everything necessary for

comfort and health, was well adapted for its objects. A pretty little

chapel adjoined the house, and the house itself was built around an open

square planted with trees,—a pleasant playground for the boys, who have

their music there in the evening. On our return to town we heard that,

owing to the breakage of some part of the machinery, the steamer would

be detained in this port for a couple of days. We have, however,

returned to our quarters on board, preferring to spend the night on the

water rather than in the hot, close town.

_August 7th._—To-day we have all been interested in watching the

beautiful Medusæ swept along by the tide, so close to the side of the

steamer that they could easily be reached from the stairway. We have now

quite a number disposed about the deck in buckets and basins, and Mr.

Burkhardt is making colored sketches of them. They are very beautiful,

and quite new to Mr. Agassiz. In some the disk has a brown tracery like

seaweed over it, while its edge is deeply lobed, every lobe being tinged

with an intensely brilliant dark blue; the lobes are divided into eight

sets of four each, making thirty-two in all, and an eye is placed on the

margin between each set; the tubes running to the eyes are much larger

than those in the intervals between, and the network of vessels on the

margin is wonderfully fine and delicate; the curtains hanging from the

mouth are white and closely fringed with full flounces, somewhat like

our Aurelia. The movement is quick, the margin of the disk beating with

short, rapid pants. Another is altogether brown and white, the

seaweed-like pattern being carried down to the edge of the lobes, and

the lobes themselves being more delicate than those of the blue-edged

one, the disk thinning out greatly towards the periphery. The brown

marks are, however, darker, more distinct, and cover a larger space in

some specimens than in others. This is also true of those with the blue

margin, the brown pattern covering the whole disk in some, confined to a

simple zone around the disk in others, and even entirely absent

occasionally. Mr. Agassiz inclines to think, from the similarity of

their other features, however, that, notwithstanding their difference of

color, they all belong to the same species, the variety in coloration

being probably connected with difference of sex. He has, at any rate,

ascertained that all the wholly brown specimens caught to-day are males.

We were rejoiced this morning by the sight of our own flag coming into

harbor. We presently found that the ship was the gunboat Nipsic. She had

sailed from Boston on the 4th of July, and brought papers of a later

date than any we have seen. The officers were kind enough to send us a

large bundle of papers, which we have been eagerly devouring.

_August 8th._—Another quite new and beautiful Medusa to-day. As we were

waiting for breakfast this morning a number floated past, so dark in

color that in the water they appeared almost black. Two of our party

took a boat and went in search of them, but the tide was so swift that

they swept past like lightning, and one had hardly time to point them

out before they were gone again. However, after many efforts, we

succeeded in getting one, whose portrait Mr. Burkhardt is now taking.

The disk is of a chocolate-brown, shading into a darker, more velvety

hue toward the edge, which is slightly scalloped, but not cut up into

deep lobes like those of yesterday. The eyes, eight in number, are

distinctly visible as lighter-colored specks on the margin. The

appendages hanging from the mouth are more solid and not so thickly

fringed as in those of yesterday. It moves rather slowly in its glass

prison, the broad margin shading from lighter brown to a soft chocolate

color almost verging on black, as it flaps up and down somewhat

languidly, but still with a regular, steady pulsation.[46]

_August 9th._—We passed yesterday afternoon with the Braga family in

town. The weather was charming, a cool breeze blowing through the

veranda where we dined. There were a number of guests to meet us, and we

had again cause to acknowledge how completely the stranger is made to

feel himself at home among these hospitable people. We sailed this

morning, Mr. Agassiz taking with him a valuable collection, though our

time was so short. The fact is, that, not only here, but at every town

where we have stopped in coming up the coast, the ready, cordial desire

of the people to help in the work has enabled him to get together

collections which it would otherwise have been impossible to make in so

short a time. If he is unexpectedly successful in this expedition, it is

as much owing to the active sympathy of the Brazilians themselves, and

to their interest in the objects he has so much at heart, as to the

efforts of himself and his companions.

_August 11th._—Pará. Early yesterday morning, a few yellowish patches

staining the ocean here and there gave us our first glimpse of the water

of the Amazons. Presently the patches became broad streaks, the fresh

waters encroaching gradually upon the sea, until, at about ten o’clock,

we fairly entered the mouth of the river, though, as the shores are some

hundred and fifty miles apart, we might have believed ourselves on the

broad ocean. As we neared the city, the numerous islands closing up

about Pará and sheltering its harbor limited the view and broke the

enormous expanse of the fresh-water basin. We anchored off the city at

about three o’clock, but a heavy thundershower, with violent rain,

prevented us from going on shore till the next morning. None of the

party landed except Major Coutinho. He went to announce our arrival to

his friend, Mr. Pimenta Bueno, who has kindly invited us to make his

house our home while we stay in Pará. The next morning was beautiful

after the rain, and at seven o’clock two boats were sent to take us and

our effects on shore. On landing we went at once to Mr. Pimenta’s large

business establishment near the wharves. Here he has provided several

excellent working-rooms to serve as laboratories and storage-places for

the specimens, and besides these a number of airy, cool chambers on the

floor above, for the accommodation of our companions, who have already

slung their hammocks, arranged their effects, and are keeping a kind of

bachelor’s hall. Having disposed of the scientific apparatus, we drove

out to Mr. Pimenta’s “chacara,” some two miles out of town, on the Rua

de Nazareth, where we were received with the utmost kindness. Mr.

Agassiz and Major Coutinho soon returned to town, where no time is to be

lost in beginning work at the laboratory. I remained at home and passed

a pleasant morning with the ladies of the family, who made me acquainted

with the peculiar beverage so famous in these regions, prepared from the

berries of the Assai palm. They are about the size of cranberries, and

of a dark-brown color. Being boiled and crushed they yield a quantity of

juice, which when strained has about the consistency of chocolate, and

is of a dark purplish tint like blackberry juice. It has a sweetish

taste, and is very nice eaten with sugar and the crisp “farinha d’agua,”

a kind of coarse flour made from the mandioca root. People of all

classes throughout the province of Pará are exceedingly fond of this

beverage, and in the city they have a proverb which runs thus:—

“Who visits Pará is glad to stay,

Who drinks Assai goes never away.”

_August 12th._—This morning we rose early and walked into town. Great

pains have been taken with the environs of Pará, and the Rua de Nazareth

is one of the broad streets leading into the country, and planted with

large trees (chiefly mangueiras) for two or three miles out of town. On

our way we saw a lofty palm-tree completely overpowered and stifled in

the embrace of an enormous parasite. So luxuriant is the growth of the

latter that you do not perceive, till it is pointed out to you, that its

spreading branches and thick foliage completely hide the tree from which

it derives its life; only from the extreme summit a few fan-like

palm-leaves shoot upwards as if trying to escape into the air and light.

The palm cannot long survive, however, and with its death it seals the

doom of its murderer also. There is another evidence, and a more

pleasing one, of the luxuriance of nature on this same road. The

skeleton of a house stands by the wayside; whether a ruin or unfinished,

I am unable to say, but at all events only the walls are standing, with

the openings for doors and windows. Nature has completed this imperfect

dwelling;—she has covered it over with a green roof, she has planted the

empty enclosure with a garden of her own choosing, she has trained vines

around the open doors and windows; and the deserted house, if it has no

other inmates, is at least a home for the birds. It makes a very pretty

picture. I never pass it without wishing for a sketch of it. On our

arrival in town we went at once to the market. It is very near the

water, and we were much amused in watching the Indian canoes at the

landing. The “montaria,” as the Indian calls his canoe, is a long,

narrow boat, covered at one end with a thatched roof, under which is the

living-room of the family. Here the Indian has his home; wife and

children, hammock, cooking utensils,—all his household goods, in fact.

In some of the boats the women were preparing breakfast, cooking the

coffee or the tapioca over a pan of coals. In others they were selling

the coarse pottery, which they make into all kinds of utensils,

sometimes of quite graceful, pretty forms. We afterwards went through

the market. It is quite large and neatly kept; but the Brazilian markets

are only good as compared with each other. The meats are generally poor;

there is little game to be seen; they have no variety of vegetables,

which might be so easily cultivated here, and even the display of fruit

in the market is by no means what one would expect it to be. To-night

Mr. Agassiz goes off with a party of gentlemen on an excursion to some

of the islands in the harbor. This first expedition in the neighborhood

of Pará, from which the Professor promises himself much pleasure, is

planned by Dr. Couto de Magalhaês, President of the Province.[47]

_August 14th._—We are very agreeably surprised in the climate here. I

had expected from the moment of our arrival in the region of the Amazons

to be gasping in a fierce, unintermitting, intolerable heat. On the

contrary, the mornings are fresh; a walk or ride between six and eight

o’clock is always delightful; and though during the middle of the day

the heat is certainly very great, it cools off again towards four

o’clock; the evenings are delightful, and the nights always comfortable.

Even in the hottest part of the day the heat is not dead; there is

always a breeze stirring. Mr. Agassiz returned this afternoon from his

excursion in the harbor, more deeply impressed than ever with the

grandeur of this entrance to the Amazons and the beauty of its many

islands, “An archipelago of islands,” as he says, “in an ocean of fresh

water.” He describes the mode of fishing of the Indians as curious. They

row very softly up the creek, having first fastened the seine across

from shore to shore at a lower point, and when they have gained a

certain distance above it, they spring into the water with a great plash

and rush down the creek in a line, driving the fish before them into the

net. One draught alone filled the boat half full of fish. Mr. Agassiz

was especially interested in seeing alive for the first time the curious

fish called “Tralhote” by the Indians, and known to naturalists as the

Anableps tetrophthalmus. This name, signifying “four-eyed,” is derived

from the singular structure of the eye. A membranous fold enclosing the

bulb of the eye stretches across the pupil, dividing the visual

apparatus into an upper and lower half. No doubt this formation is

intended to suit the peculiar habits of the Anableps. These fishes

gather in shoals on the surface of the water, their heads resting partly

above, partly below the surface, and they move by a leaping motion

somewhat like that of frogs on land. Thus, half in air, half in water,

they require eyes adapted for seeing in both elements, and the

arrangement described above just meets this want.

_August 19th._—To-night at ten o’clock we go on board the steamer, and

before dawn shall be on our way up the river. This has been a delicious

week of rest and refreshment to me. The quiet country life, with morning

walks in the fresh, fragrant lanes and roads immediately about us, has

been very soothing after four months of travel or of noisy hotel life.

The other day as we were going into town we found in the wet grass by

the roadside one of the most beautiful mushrooms I have ever seen. The

stem was pure white, three or four inches in height, and about half an

inch in diameter, surmounted by a club-shaped head, brown in color, with

a blunt point, and from the base of this head was suspended an open

white net of exquisitely delicate texture, falling to within about an

inch of the ground; a fairy web that looked fit for Queen Mab

herself.[48] The week, so peaceful for me, has been one, if not of rest,

at least of intense interest for Mr. Agassiz. The very day of his

arrival, by the kindness of our host, his working-rooms were so arranged

as to make an admirable laboratory, and, from the hour he entered them,

specimens have poured in upon him from all quarters. His own party make

but a small part of the scientific corps who have worked for and with

him here. In Pará alone he has already more than fifty new species of

fresh-water fishes; enough to reveal unexpected and novel relations in

the finny world, and to give the basis of an improved classification. He

is far from attributing this great success wholly to his own efforts.

Ready as he is to work, he could not accomplish half that he does,

except for the active good-will of those about him. Among the most

valuable of these contributions is a collection made by Mr. Pimenta

Bueno, of the so-called fishes of the forest. When the waters overflow

after the rainy season and fill the forest for a considerable distance

on either side, these fish hover over the depressions and hollows, and

as the waters subside are left in the pools and channels. They do not

occur in the open river, but are always found in these forest retreats,

and go by the name of the “Peixe do Mato.”

Mr. Agassiz has not only to acknowledge the untiring kindness of

individuals here, but also the cordial expression of sympathy from

public bodies in the objects of the expedition. A committee from the

municipality of the city has waited upon him to express the general

satisfaction in the undertaking, and he has received a public

demonstration of the same kind from the college. The bishop of the

province and his coadjutor have also been most cordial in offers of

assistance. Nor does the interest thus expressed evaporate in empty

words. Mr. Pimenta Bueno is director of the Brazilian line of steamers

from Pará to Tabatinga.[49] The trip to Manaos, at the mouth of the Rio

Negro, is generally made in five days, allowing only for stoppages of an

hour or two at different stations, to take or leave passengers and to

deposit or receive merchandise. In order that we may be perfectly

independent, however, and stop wherever it seems desirable to make

collections, the company places at our disposition a steamer for one

month between Pará and Manaos. There are to be no passengers but

ourselves, and the steamer is provided with everything necessary for the

whole company during that period,—food, service, &c. I think it may

fairly be said that in no part of the world could a private scientific

undertaking be greeted with more cordiality or receive a more liberal

hospitality than has been accorded to the present expedition. I dwell

upon these things and recur to them often, not in any spirit of egotism,

but because it is due to the character of the people from whom they come

to make the fullest acknowledgment of their generosity.

While Mr. Agassiz has been busy with the zoölogical collections, Major

Coutinho has been no less so in making geological, meteorological, and

hydrographic investigations. His regular co-operation is invaluable, and

Mr. Agassiz blesses the day when their chance meeting at the Palace

suggested the idea of his joining the expedition. Not only his

scientific attainments, but his knowledge of the Indian language

(_lingua geral_), and his familiarity with the people, make him a most

important coadjutor. With his aid Mr. Agassiz has already opened a sort

of scientific log-book, in which, by the side of the scientific name of

every specimen entered by the Professor, Major Coutinho records its

popular local name, obtained from the Indians, with all they can tell of

its haunts and habits.

I have said nothing of Mr. Agassiz’s observations on the character of

the soil since we left Rio, thinking it best to give them as a whole.

Along the entire length of the coast he has followed the drift,

examining it carefully at every station. At Bahia it contained fewer

large boulders than in Rio, but was full of small pebbles, and rested

upon undecomposed stratified rock. At Maceió, the capital of the

province of Alagôas, it was the same, but resting upon decomposed rock,

as at Tijuca. Below this was a bed of stratified clay, containing small

pebbles. In Pernambuco, on our drive to the great aqueduct, we followed

it for the whole way; the same red clayey homogeneous paste, resting

there on decomposed rock. The line of contact at Monteiro, the aqueduct

station, was very clearly marked, however, by an intervening bed of

pebbles. At Parahyba do Norte the same sheet of drift, but containing

more and larger pebbles, rests above a decomposed sandstone somewhat

resembling the decomposed rock of Pernambuco. In the undecomposed rock

below, Mr. Agassiz found some fossil shells. In the neighborhood of Cape

St. Roque we came upon sand-dunes resembling those of Cape Cod, and

wherever we sailed near enough to the shore to see the banks distinctly,

as was frequently the case, the bed of drift below the shifting

superficial sands above was distinctly noticeable. The difference in

color between the white sand and the reddish soil beneath made it easy

to perceive their relations. At Ceará, where we landed, Mr. Agassiz had

an opportunity of satisfying himself of this by closer examination. At

Maranham the drift is everywhere conspicuous, and at Pará equally so.

This sheet of drift which he has thus followed from Rio de Janeiro to

the mouth of the Amazons is everywhere of the same geological

constitution. It is always a homogeneous clayey paste of a reddish

color, containing quartz pebbles; and, whatever be the character of the

rock in place, whether granite, sandstone, gneiss, or lime, the

character of the drift never changes or partakes of that of the rocks

with which it is in contact. This certainly proves that, whatever be its

origin, it cannot be referred to the localities where it is now found,

but must have been brought from a distance. Whoever shall track it back

to the place where this peculiar red soil with its constituent elements

forms the primitive rock, will have solved the problem. I introduce here

a letter written by Mr. Agassiz, a few days later, to the Emperor, which

will better give his views on the subject.

A BORD DE L’ICAMIABA, SUR L’AMAZONE,

le 20 Aout, 1865.

SIRE:—Permettez moi de rendre un compte rapide à Votre Majesté, de ce

que j’ai observé de plus intéressant depuis mon départ de Rio. La

première chose qui m’a frappé en arrivant à Bahia, ce fut d’y trouver le

terrain erratique, comme à la Tijuca et comme dans la partie méridionale

de Minas, que j’ai visitée. Ici comme là, ce terrain, d’une constitution

identique, repose sur les roches en place les plus diversifiées. Je l’ai

retrouvé de même à Maceio, à Pernambuco, à Parahyba do Norte, à Ceará, à

Maranham, et au Pará. Voilà donc un fait établi sur la plus grande

échelle! Cela démontre que les matériaux superficiels, que l’on pourrait

désigner du nom de drift, ici comme dans le Nord de l’Europe et de

l’Amérique, ne sauraient être le résultat de la décomposition des roches

sous-jacentes, puisque celles-ci sont tantôt du granit, tantôt du

gneiss, tantôt du schiste micacé ou talqueux, tantôt du grès, tandis que

le drift offre partout la même composition. Je n’en suis pas moins aussi

éloigné que jamais de pouvoir signaler l’origine de ces matériaux et la

direction de leur transport. Aujourd’hui que le Major Coutinho a appris

à distinguer le drift des roches décomposées, il m’assure que nous le

retrouverons dans toute la vallée de l’Amazône. L’imagination la plus

hardie recule devant toute espèce de généralisation à ce sujet. Et

pourtant, il faudra bien en venir à se familiariser avec l’idée que la

cause qui a dispersé ces matériaux, quelle qu’elle soit, a agi sur la

plus grande échelle, puisqu’on les retrouvera probablement sur tout le

continent. Déjà j’apprends que mes jeunes compagnons de voyage ont

observé le drift dans les environs de Barbacena et d’Ouro-Preto et dans

la vallée du Rio das Velhas. Mes résultats zoologiques ne sont pas moins

satisfaisants; et pour ne parler que des poissons, j’ai trouvé à Pará

seulement, pendant une semaine, plus d’espèces qu’on n’en a décrit

jusqu’à présent de tout le bassin de l’Amazône; c. à. d. en tout

soixante-trois. Cette étude sera, je crois, utile à l’ichthyologie, car

j’ai déjà pu distinguer cinq familles nouvelles et dix-huit genres

nouveaux et les espèces inédites ne s’élèvent pas à moins de

quarante-neuf. C’est une garantie que je ferai encore une riche moisson,

lorsque j’entrerai dans le domaine de l’Amazône proprement dit; car je

n’ai encore vu qu’un dixième des espèces fluviatiles que l’on connait de

ce bassin et les quelques espèces marines qui remontent jusqu’au Pará.

Malheureusement M. Burkhardt est malade et je n’ai encore pu faire

peindre que quatre des espèces nouvelles que je me suis procurées, et

puis près de la moitié n’ont été prises qu’en exemplaires uniques. Il

faut absolument qu’à mon retour je fasse un plus long séjour au Pará

pour remplir ces lacunes. Je suis dans le ravissement de la nature

grandiose que j’ai sous les yeux. Votre Majesté régne sans contredit sur

le plus bel empire du monde et toutes personelles que soient les

attentions que je reçois partout où je m’arrête, je ne puis m’empêcher

de croire que n’était le caractère généreux et hospitalier des

Brésiliens et l’intérêt des classes supérieures pour le progrès des

sciences et de la civilisation, je n’aurais point rencontré les

facilités qui se pressent sous mes pas. C’est ainsi que pour me

faciliter l’exploration du fleuve, du Pará à Manaos, M. Pimenta Bueno,

au lieu de m’acheminer par le steamer régulier, a mis à ma disposition,

pour un mois ou six semaines, un des plus beaux bateaux de la compagnie,

où je suis instalé aussi commodément que dans mon Musée à Cambridge. M.

Coutinho est plein d’attention et me rend mon travail doublement facile

en le préparant à l’avance par tous les renseignements possibles.

Mais je ne veux pas abuser des loisirs de Votre Majesté et je la prie de

croire toujours au dévouement le plus complet et à l’affection la plus

respectueuse

De son très humble et très obéissant serviteur,

L. AGASSIZ.[50]

-----

Footnote 43:

Mr. Agassiz was indebted to Mr. Hitch for valuable additions to his

collections, and for many acts of kindness in behalf of the

expedition.

Footnote 44:

Here, as elsewhere, I found ready and willing coadjutors among amateur

collectors. On my return from the Amazons, many months later, I found

collections made in my absence by Dr. Mendes and Senhor Barroso, who

had been our companions on board the steamer. At Parahyba do Norte I

was indebted in the same way to Dr. Justa. These collections will

afford invaluable materials for the comparison of the Coast Faunæ.—L.

A.

Footnote 45:

At a later period I owed to Dr. Braga far more than the ordinary

courtesy extended to a stranger. I had informed him that Mr. St. John,

then following the course of the Rio San Francisco, on his way to the

province of Piauhy, would arrive in Maranham at the close of his

journey. When he reached that city he was very seriously ill with

fever. Dr. Braga took him into his house, where he was attended by him

and his family as if he had been one of their kindred. I have, indeed,

little doubt that my young friend owed his recovery to the considerate

care with which he was treated under their kindly roof.—L. A.

Footnote 46:

These two Medusæ belong to the Rhizostomidæ, and I shall take an early

opportunity to publish a description of them, with the drawings of Mr.

Burkhardt.—L. A.

Footnote 47:

To Dr. Couto de Magalhaês Mr. Agassiz was indebted for unremitting

attentions during our stay in the region of the Amazons. He never

failed to facilitate the success of the expedition by every means in

his power, and the large collections made under his directions during

our sojourn upon the Upper Amazons were among the most valuable

contributions to its scientific results. When he heard that Mr. Ward,

one of our young companions, was coming down the Tocantins, he sent a

boat and boatmen to meet him, and on his arrival in Pará received him

in his own house, where he remained his guest during his stay in the

city.

Footnote 48:

This mushroom belongs to the genus Phallus, and seems to be an

undescribed species. I preserved it in alcohol, but was unable to have

any drawing made from it before its beauty and freshness were quite

gone. In the early morning, while the grass was still damp, we often

found a peculiar snail, a species of Bulimus, creeping by the

roadside. The form of the anterior part of the foot was unlike that of

any species known thus far from this group. Such facts show the

desirableness of making drawings from the soft parts of these animals

as well as from their solid envelopes.—L. A.

Footnote 49:

The President of this line is the Baron de Mazá, esteemed by his

countrymen as a financier of great ability and a man of rare energy,

perseverance, and patriotism. As he was in Europe during the year of

my visit to Brazil, I had not the pleasure of a personal acquaintance

with him, and I therefore welcome this opportunity of thanking him for

the liberality shown in all their dealings with me by the company of

which he is the moving spirit.—L. A.

Footnote 50:

ON BOARD THE ICAMIABA, ON THE AMAZONS,

August 20, 1865.

SIRE:—Allow me to give your Majesty a rapid sketch of the most

interesting facts observed by me since leaving Rio. The first thing

which struck me on arriving at Bahia was the presence of the erratic

soil, corresponding to that of Tijuca and the southern part of

Minas-Geräes, which I have visited. Here, as there, this soil,

identical in its constitution, rests upon rocks in place, of the most

diversified character. I have found it also at Maceió, at Pernambuco,

at Parahyba do Norte, at Ceará, at Maranham, and at Pará. This is a

fact, then, established on the largest scale. It shows that the

superficial materials which, here as in the North of Europe and

America, may be designated as drift, cannot be the result of the

decomposition of underlying rocks, since the latter are sometimes

granite, sometimes gneiss, sometimes mica or talcose slate, sometimes

sandstone, while the drift presents the same composition everywhere. I

am as far as ever from being able to point out the origin of these

materials and the direction of their transportation. Now that Major

Coutinho has learned to distinguish the drift from the decomposed

rocks, he assures me that we shall find it throughout the valley of

the Amazons. The boldest imagination shrinks from any generalization

on this subject, and yet we must gradually familiarize ourselves with

the idea that the cause which has dispersed these materials, whatever

it be, has acted on the largest scale, since they are probably to be

found all over the continent. Already I learn that my young travelling

companions have observed the drift in the environs of Barbacena and

Ouro-Preto, and in the valley of the Rio das Velhas. My zoölogical

results are not less satisfactory; and to speak of the fishes alone, I

have found at Pará during one week more species than have as yet been

described from the whole basin of the Amazons,—sixty-three in all.

This study will be useful, I hope, to ichthyology, for I have already

succeeded in distinguishing five new families and eighteen new genera,

while the unpublished species do not number less than forty-nine. It

is a guaranty of the rich harvest I shall make when I enter upon the

domain of the Amazons properly so called; for I have seen as yet but a

tenth part of the fluviatile species known from this basin, and some

of the marine species which come up to Pará. Unhappily, Mr. Burkhardt

is ill, and has been able to paint but four of the new species we have

procured; and of nearly half the number, only single specimens have

been secured. On my return I must make a longer stay in Pará in order

to fill these deficiencies. I am enchanted with the grandeur of nature

here. Your Majesty certainly reigns over the most beautiful empire of

the world; and, personal as are the attentions which I receive

wherever I stop, I cannot but believe that, were it not for the

generous and hospitable character of the Brazilians and the interest

of the higher classes in the progress of science and civilization, I

should not have met with the facilities which crowd my path. Thus, in

order to render the exploration of the river from Pará to Manaos more

easy, Mr. Pimenta Bueno, instead of allowing me to take the regular

steamer, has put at my disposition, for a month or six weeks, one of

the finest boats of the company, where I am installed as conveniently

as in my Museum at Cambridge. Mr. Coutinho is full of attention, and

renders my work doubly light by procuring, in advance, all the

information possible. But I will not further abuse your Majesty’s

leisure, only begging you to believe in the complete devotion and

respectful affection of

Your humble and obedient servant,

L. AGASSIZ.

CHAPTER V.

FROM PARÁ TO MANAOS.

FIRST SUNDAY ON THE AMAZONS.—GEOGRAPHICAL QUESTION.—CONVENIENT

ARRANGEMENTS OF STEAMER.—VAST DIMENSIONS OF THE

RIVER.—ASPECT OF SHORES.—VILLAGE OF BREVES.—LETTER ABOUT

COLLECTIONS.—VEGETATION.—VARIETY OF PALMS.—SETTLEMENT OF

TAJAPURÚ.—ENORMOUS SIZE OF LEAVES OF THE MIRITI PALM.—WALK

ON SHORE.—INDIAN HOUSES.—COURTESY OF INDIANS.—ROW IN THE

FOREST.—TOWN OF GURUPÁ.—RIVER XINGU.—COLOR OF WATER.—TOWN OF

PORTO DO MOZ.—FLAT-TOPPED HILLS OF ALMEYRIM.—BEAUTIFUL

SUNSET.—MONTE ALÉGRE.—CHARACTER OF SCENERY AND

SOIL.—SANTAREM.—SEND OFF PARTY ON THE RIVER

TAPAJOS.—CONTINUE UP THE AMAZONS.—PASTORAL SCENES ON THE

BANKS.—TOWN OF VILLA BELLA.—CANOE JOURNEY AT NIGHT TO THE

LAKE OF JOSÉ ASSÚ.—ESPERANÇA’S COTTAGE.—PICTURESQUE SCENE AT

NIGHT.—SUCCESS IN COLLECTING.—INDIAN LIFE.—MAKING

FARINHA.—DANCE IN THE EVENING.—HOWLING MONKEYS.—RELIGIOUS

IMPRESSIONS OF INDIANS.—COTTAGE OF MAIA THE FISHERMAN.—HIS

INTEREST IN EDUCATING HIS CHILDREN.—RETURN TO

STEAMER.—SCIENTIFIC RESULTS OF THE EXCURSION.

_August 20th._—On board the “Icamiaba.” Our first Sunday on the Amazons;

for, notwithstanding the warm dispute as to whether both the rivers

enclosing the island of Marajó must be considered as parts of the great

river, it is impossible not to feel from the moment you leave Pará that

you have entered upon the Amazons. Geology must settle this knotty

question. If it should be seen that the continent once presented an

unbroken line, as Mr. Agassiz believes, from Cape St. Roque to Cayenne,

the sea having encroached upon it so as to give it its present limits,

the Amazons must originally have entered the ocean far to the east of

its present mouth, at a time when the Island of Marajó divided the river

in two channels flowing on either side of it and uniting again beyond

it. We came on board last night, accompanied to the boat by a number of

the friends who have made our sojourn in Pará so agreeable, and who came

off to bid us farewell. Thus far the hardships of this South American

journey seem to retreat at our approach. It is impossible to travel with

greater comfort than surrounds us here. My own suite of rooms consists

of a good-sized state-room, with dressing-room and bath-room adjoining,

and, if the others are not quite so luxuriously accommodated, they have

space enough. The state-rooms are hardly used at night, for a hammock on

deck is far more comfortable in this climate. Our deck, roofed in for

its whole length, and with an awning to let down on the sides, if

needed, looks like a comfortable, unceremonious sitting-room. A table

down the middle serving as a dinner-table, but which is at this moment

strewn with maps, journals, books, and papers of all sorts, two or three

lounging-chairs, a number of camp-stools, and half a dozen hammocks, in

one or two of which some of the party are taking their ease, furnish our

drawing-room, and supply all that is needed for work and rest. At one

end is also a drawing-table for Mr. Burkhardt, beside a number of kegs

and glass jars for specimens. This first day, however, it is almost

impossible to do more than look and wonder. Mr. Agassiz says: “This

river is not like a river; the general current in such a sea of fresh

water is hardly perceptible to the sight, and seems more like the flow

of an ocean than like that of an inland stream.” It is true we are

constantly between shores, but they are shores, not of the river itself,

but of the countless islands scattered throughout its enormous breadth.

As we coast along their banks, it is delightful to watch the exquisite

vegetation with which we have yet to become familiar. The tree which

most immediately strikes the eye, and stands out from the mass of green

with wonderful grace and majesty, is the lofty, slender Assai palm, with

its crown of light plume-like leaves, and its bunches of berry-like

fruit, hanging from a branch that shoots out almost horizontally, just

below the leaves. Houses on the shore break the solitude here and there.

From this distance they look picturesque, with thatched, overhanging

roofs, covering a kind of open porch. Just now we passed a cleared nook

at the water-side, where a wooden cross marked a single mound. What a

lonely grave it seemed! We are now coasting along the Isle of Marajó,

keeping up the so-called Pará river; we shall not enter the undisputed

waters of the Amazons till the day after to-morrow. This part of the

river goes also by the name of the Bay of Marajó.

_August 21st._—Last evening we stopped at our first station,—the little

town of Breves. Its population, like that of all these small settlements

on the Lower Amazons, is made up of an amalgamation of races. You see

the regular features and fair skin of the white man combined with the

black, coarse, straight hair of the Indian, or the mulatto with partly

negro, partly Indian features, but the crisp taken out of the hair; and

with these combinations comes in the pure Indian type, with its low

brow, square build of face, and straight line of the shoulders. In the

women especially the shoulders are rather high. In the first house we

entered there was only an old half-breed Indian-woman, standing in the

broad open porch of her thatched home, where she seemed to be surrounded

with live stock,—parrots and parroquets of all sorts and sizes, which

she kept for sale. After looking in at several of the houses, buying one

or two monkeys, some parroquets, and some articles of the village

pottery, as ugly, I must say, as they were curious, we wandered up into

the forest to gather plants for drying. The palms are more abundant,

larger, and in greater variety than we have seen them hitherto. At dusk

we returned to the steamer, where we found a crowd of little boys and

some older members of the village population, with snakes, fishes,

insects, monkeys, &c. The news had spread that the collecting of “bixos”

was the object of this visit to their settlement, and all were thronging

in with their live wares of different kinds. Mr. Agassiz was very much

pleased with this first harvest. He added a considerable number of new

species to his collection of Amazonian fishes made in Pará, already so

full and rare. We remained at the Breves landing all night, and this

morning we are steaming along between islands, in a channel which bears

the name of the river Aturia. It gives an idea of the grandeur of the

Amazons, that many of the channels dividing the islands by which its

immense breadth is broken are themselves like ample rivers, and among

the people here are known by distinct local names. The banks are flat;

we have seen no cliffs as yet, and the beauty of the scenery is wholly

in the forest. I speak more of the palms than of other trees, because

they are not to be mistaken, and from their peculiar port they stand out

in bold relief from the mass of foliage, often rising above it and

sharply defined against the sky. There are, however, a host of other

trees, the names of which are unknown to us as yet, many of which I

suppose have no place even in botanical nomenclature, forming a dense

wall of verdure along the banks of the river. We have sometimes heard it

said that the voyage up the Amazons is monotonous; but to me it seems

delightful to coast along by these woods, of a character so new to us,

to get glimpses into their dark depths or into a cleared spot with a

single stately palm here and there, or to catch even the merest glance

at the life of the people who live in the isolated settlements,

consisting only of one or two Indian houses by the river-side. We are

keeping so near to the banks to-day, that we can almost count the leaves

on the trees, and have an excellent opportunity of studying the various

kinds of palms. At first the Assai was most conspicuous, but now come in

a number of others. The Mirití (Mauritia) is one of the most beautiful,

with its pendant clusters of reddish fruit and its enormous, spreading,

fan-like leaves cut into ribbons, one of which Wallace says is a load

for a man. The Jupatí (Rhaphia), with its plume-like leaves, sometimes

from forty to fifty feet in length, seems, in consequence of its short

stem, to start almost from the ground. Its vase-like form is peculiarly

graceful and symmetrical. Then there is the Bussù (Manicaria), with

stiff, entire leaves, some thirty feet in length, more upright and close

in their mode of growth, and serrated along their edges. The stem of

this palm also is comparatively short. The banks in this part of the

river are very generally bordered by two plants forming sometimes a sort

of hedge along the shore; namely, the Aninga (Arum), with large,

heart-shaped leaves on the summit of tall stems, and the Murici, a lower

growth, just on the water’s edge. We are passing out of the so-called

river Aturia into another channel of like character, the river Tajapurú.

In the course of the day we shall arrive at a little settlement bearing

the same name, where is to be our second station.

_August 22d._—Yesterday we passed the day at the settlement mentioned

above. It consists only of the house of a Brazilian merchant,[51] who

lives here with his family, having no neighbors except the inhabitants

of a few Indian houses in the forest immediately about. One wonders at

first what should induce a man to isolate himself in this solitude. But

the India-rubber trade is very productive here. The Indians tap the

trees as we tap our sugar-maples, and give the produce in exchange for

various articles of their own domestic consumption. Our day at Tajapurú

was a very successful one in a scientific point of view, and the

collections were again increased by a number of new species. Much as has

been said of the number and variety of fishes in the Amazons, the fauna

seems far richer than it has been reported. For those of my readers who

care to follow the scientific progress of the expedition as well as the

thread of personal adventure, I add here a letter on the subject,

written a day or two later by Mr. Agassiz to Mr. Pimenta Bueno, in Pará,

the generous friend to whom he owes in a great degree the facilities he

enjoys in this voyage.

22 Aout, au matin: entre Tajapurú et Gurupá.

MON CHER AMI:—La journée d’hier a été des plus instructives, surtout

pour les poissons “do Mato.” Nous avons obtenu quinze espèces en

tout. Sur ce nombre il y en a dix nouvelles, quatre qui se trouvent

aussi au Pará et une déjà décrite par moi dans le voyage de Spix et

Martius; mais ce qu’il y a de plus intéressant, c’est la preuve que

fournissent ces espèces, à les prendre dans leur totalité, que

l’ensemble des poissons qui habitent les eaux à l’ouest du groupe

d’îles qu’on appelle Marajó, diffère de ceux des eaux du Rio do

Pará. La liste des noms que nous avons demandée aux Indiens prouve

encore que le nombre des espèces qui se trouvent dans ces localités

est beaucoup plus considérable que celui des espèces que nous avons

pu nous procurer; aussi avons nous laissé des bocaux à Breves et à

Tajapurú pour compléter la collection.

Voici quelques remarques qui vous feront mieux apprécier ces

différences, si vous voulez les comparer avec le catalogue des

espèces du Pará que je vous ai laissé. À tout prendre, il me parait

évident dès à présent que notre voyage fera une révolution dans

l’Ichthyologie. Et d’abord, le Jacundá de Tajapurú est différent des

espèces du Pará; de même l’Acará; puis nous avons une espèce

nouvelle de Sarapó et une espèce nouvelle de Jeju; une espèce

nouvelle de Rabeca, une espèce nouvelle d’Anojá, un genre nouveau de

Candiru, un genre nouveau de Bagre, un genre nouveau d’Acary et une

espèce nouvelle d’Acary du même genre que celui du Pará; plus une

espèce nouvelle de Matupirim. Ajoutez à ceci une espèce d’Aracu déjà

décrite, mais qui ne se trouve pas au Pará et vous aurez à Tajapurú

onze espèces qui n’existent pas au Pará, auxquelles il faut ajouter

encore quatre espèces qui se trouvent à Tajapurú aussi bien qu’au

Pará, et une qui se trouve au Pará, à Brèves, et à Tajapurú. En tout

vingt espèces, dont quinze nouvelles, en deux jours. Malheureusement

les Indiens ont mal compris nos directions, et ne nous ont rapporté

qu’un seul exemplaire de chacune de ces espèces. Il reste donc

beaucoup à faire dans ces localités, surtout à en juger d’après le

catalogue des noms recueillis par le Major Coutinho qui renferme

vingt-six espèces “do Mato” et quarante-six “do Rio.” Il nous en

manque donc au moins cinquante-deux de Tajapurú, même à supposer que

cette localité renferme aussi les cinq espèces de Breves. Vous voyez

que nous laisserons encore énormément à faire à nos successeurs.

Adieu pour aujourd’hui, votre bien affectioné

L. AGASSIZ.[52]

The Indians here are very skilful in fishing, and instead of going to

collect, Mr. Agassiz, immediately on arriving at any station, sends off

several fishermen of the place, remaining himself on board to

superintend the drawing and putting up of the specimens as they

arrive.[53] He made at Tajapurú a collection of the leaves and fruit of

palms, of which there were several very beautiful ones near the shore. I

sat for a long time on the deck watching an Indian cutting a leaf from a

Mirití palm. He was sitting in the crotch of a single leaf, as safe and

as perfectly supported as if he had been on the branch of an oak-tree,

and it took many blows of his heavy axe to separate the leaf at his side

which he was trying to bring down. The heat during the day was intense,

but at about five o’clock it became quite cool and R—— and I strolled on

shore. Walking here is a peculiar process, and seems rather alarming

till you become accustomed to it. A great part of the land, even far up

into the forest, is overflowed, and single logs are thrown across the

streams and pools, over which the inhabitants walk with as much security

as on a broad road, but which seem anything but safe to the new-comer.

After we had gone a little way we came to an Indian house on the border

of the wood. Here we were very cordially invited to enter, and had again

cause to comment on the tidy aspect of the porch, which is their general

reception-room. A description of one of these dwellings will do for all.

Their materials are drawn from the forest about them. The frames are

made of tall, slender tree-trunks, crossing each other at right angles.

Between these are woven long palm-leaves, making an admirable thatch, or

sometimes the walls are filled in with mud. The roof overhangs, covering

the wide, open porch, which extends the length of one side of the house,

and is as deep as a good-sized room; it is usually left open on the

sides as well as in front. Within, the rest of the house is divided off

into one or more chambers, according to its size. I have not penetrated

into these, but can bear testimony to the usual cleanliness and order of

the outer room. The hard mud-floor is neatly swept, there is no litter

about, and, except for the mosquitoes, I should think it no hardship to

sling my hammock for the night under the thatched roof of one of these

primitive veranda-like apartments. There is one element of dirt common

in the houses of our own poor which is absent here. Instead of the mass

of old musty bedding, a nest for vermin, the Indians have their cool

hammocks, slung from side to side of the room. One feature in their mode

of building deserves to be mentioned. Owing to the submerged state of

the ground on which they live, the Indians often raise their houses on

piles sunk in the water. Here we have the old lacustrine buildings, so

much discussed of late years, reproduced for us. One even sees sometimes

a little garden lifted in this way above the water.

But to return to our walk. One of the Indians invited us to continue our

ramble to his house, which he said was not far beyond, in the forest. We

readily complied, for the path he pointed out to us looked tempting in

the extreme, leading into the depth of the wood. Under his guidance we

continued for some distance, every now and then crossing one of the

forest creeks on the logs. Seeing that I was rather timid, he cut for me

a long pole, with the aid of which I felt quite brave. But at last we

came to a place where the water was so deep that I could not touch

bottom with my pole, and as the round log on which I was to cross was

rather rocking and unsteady, I did not dare to advance. I told him, in

my imperfect Portuguese, that I was afraid. “Naō, mia branca” (No, my

white) he said, reassuringly; “naō tem medo” (don’t be afraid). Then, as

if a thought struck him, he motioned me to wait, and, going a few steps

up the creek, he unloosed his boat, brought it down to the spot where we

stood, and put us across to the opposite shore. Just beyond was his

pretty, picturesque home, where he showed me his children, telling me

their ages, and introduced me to his wife. There is a natural courtesy

about these people which is very attractive, and which Major Coutinho,

who has lived among them a great deal, tells me is a general

characteristic of the Amazonian Indians. When we took leave of them and

returned to the canoe, I supposed our guide would simply put us across

to the other shore, a distance of a few feet only, as he had done in

coming. Instead of that he headed the canoe up the creek into the wood.

I shall never forget that row, the more enchanting that it was so

unexpected, through the narrow water-path, overarched by a solid roof of

verdure, and black with shadows; and yet it was not gloomy, for outside,

the sun was setting in crimson and gold, and its last beams struck in

under the boughs and lit the interior of the forest with a warm glow.

Nor shall I easily forget the face of our Indian friend, who had

welcomed us so warmly to his home, and who evidently enjoyed our

exclamations of delight and the effect of the surprise he had given us.

The creek led by a detour back into the river, a few rods above the

landing where our steamer lay. Our friendly boatman left us at the

stairway with a cordial good-by, and many thanks from us at parting.

We left our landing early this morning, and at about half past ten

turned into the main Amazons. Thus far we have been in what is called

the Pará river, and the branches connecting it with the Amazons proper.

The proportions of everything in nature amaze one here, however much one

may have heard or read about them. For two days and nights we have been

following the isle of Marajo, which, though but an island in the mouth

of the Amazons, is half as large as Ireland. I add here a second letter

from Mr. Agassiz to Mr. Pimenta Bueno, giving a short summary of his

scientific progress.

MON CHER AMI:—Je suis exténué de fatigue, mais je ne veux pas aller

me reposer avant de vous avoir écrit un mot. Hier soir nous avons

obtenu vingt-sept espèces de poissons à Gurupá et ce matin,

cinquante-sept à Porto do Moz, en tout quatre-vingt-quatre espèces

en moins de douze heures et, sur ce nombre, il y en à cinquante et

une nouvelles. C’est merveilleux. Je ne puis plus mettre en ordre ce

qu’on m’apporte au fur et à mesure que cela arrive; et quant à

obtenir des dessins coloriés du tout, il n’en est plus question, à

moins qu’à notre retour nous ne passions une semaine entière ici.

Tout à vous,

L. AGASSIZ.[54]

_August 23d._—Yesterday morning, before reaching the little town of

Gurupá, we passed a forest of Miriti palms; it is the first time we have

seen a palm wood exclusive of other trees. In the afternoon we stopped

at Gurupá and went on shore; but just as we landed, a violent

thunder-storm burst upon us with sheets of rain, and we saw little of

the town except the inside of the house where we took shelter. Mr.

Agassiz obtained a most valuable collection of “forest fishes,”

containing a number of new species; the Indians enumerate, however, some

seventy distinct species of forest fishes in this vicinity, so that,

notwithstanding his success, he leaves much to be done by those who

shall come after him. We left during the night, and this morning we

entered the river Xingu, stopping at Porto do Moz. The water is very

blue and dark as compared with the muddy waters of the main river. Here

Mr. Agassiz found two collections, one of forest fishes, the other of

river fishes, awaiting him, Mr. Pimenta Bueno having sent messengers by

the last steamer to a number of ports, desiring that collections should

be in readiness for him. The harvest of this morning, however, was such

an one as makes an era in the life of a naturalist, for it contained

forty-eight new species,—more, Mr. Agassiz said, than it had ever fallen

to his lot to find in the course of a single day. Ever since we entered

the Amazons the forest seems to me, though more luxuriant, less sombre

than it did about Rio. It is more transparent and more smiling; one sees

into it, and sees the sunshine glimmering through it and lighting up its

depths. The steamer has just left behind the first open land we have

passed,—wide, extensive flats, with scarcely a tree, and covered with

thick, coarse grass.

_August 24th._—Yesterday afternoon we saw, on the north side of the

river, the first elevations of any consequence one meets on the Amazons,

the singular flat-topped hills of Almeirim. They are cut off as squarely

on the top as if levelled with a plane, and divided from each other by

wide openings, the sides being shaved down with the same evenness as the

summits. Much has been said about the geology of these singular hills,

but no one has fairly investigated it. Von Martius landed, and

ascertained their height to be about eight hundred feet above the level

of the river, but beyond this, no one seems to know anything of their

real nature. They are generally represented as spurs of the higher

table-land of Guiana.[55] Last evening was the most beautiful we have

seen on the Amazons. We sat on the front upper deck as the crimson sun

went down, his broad red pathway across the water followed presently by

the pale trembling line of light from the crescent moon above. After the

sun had vanished, broad rays of rose-color, shooting almost to the

zenith, still attested his power, lending something of their glow also

to a great mass of white clouds in the east, the reflection of which

turned the yellow waters of the river to silver, while between glory and

glory the deep blue sky of night gathered over the hills of Almeirim.

This morning at dawn we stopped at the little settlement of Prainha, but

did not land, and we are now on our way to Monte Alégre, where we shall

pass a day and a half.

_August 25th._—Monte Alégre. We arrived before this town, situated on

the north side of the Amazons, at the mouth of the river Gurupatuba,

yesterday at about midday, but the heat was so great that I did not go

on shore till towards evening. The town is situated on the summit of a

hill sloping rather steeply upward from the shore, and it takes its name

from a mountain some four leagues to the northwest of it. But though the

ground is more broken and various than we have seen it hitherto, the

place does not seem to me to deserve its name of Monte Alégre (the gay

mountain). To me the aspect of the country here is, on the contrary,

rather sombre; the soil consists everywhere of sand, the forest is low,

while here and there intervene wide, swampy flats, covered with coarse

grass. The sand rests above the same reddish drift, filled with smooth

rounded quartz pebbles, that we have followed along our whole road. Here

and there the pebbles are disposed in undulating lines, as if a partial

stratification had taken place; and in some localities we saw

indications of the drift having been worked over by water, though not

absolutely stratified. Both at sunset and sunrise I took a walk to the

village churchyard, which commands the prettiest view in the

neighborhood. It is enclosed in a picket fence, a large wooden cross

stands in the centre, and there are a few other small crosses marking

graves; but the place looked uncared for, grown over, wherever the sand

was not bare, by the same coarse, rank shrubs which spring up everywhere

in this ungenial soil.[56] At a little distance from the churchyard, the

hill slopes abruptly down, and from its brow one looks across a wide

plain covered with low forest, to the mountain on the other side, from

which the town takes its name. Looking southward, the foreground is

filled with lakes divided from each other by low alluvial lands, forming

the level flats alluded to above. Though one of the earliest settlements

on the Amazons, this town is, by all accounts, rather decreasing than

increasing in population. In the midst of its public square stands what

seems at first to be the ruin of a large stone church, but which is, in

fact, the framework of a cathedral begun forty years ago, and standing

unfinished to this day. Cows were pastured in its grass-grown aisles,

and it seemed a rather sad memorial, bespeaking a want of prosperity in

the place. We were most kindly entertained in the house of Senhor

Manuel, who, finding that the mosquitoes were likely to be very thick on

board the steamer, invited us to pass the night under his roof. This

morning we are sailing about in the neighborhood, partly for the sake of

getting fish, but passing also a couple of hours at a cattle-farm near

by, in order to bring on board a number of cows and oxen for the Manaos

market. It seems that one of the chief occupations here is the raising

of cattle. This, with the sale of fish, cacáo, and India-rubber,

constitutes the commerce of the place.

_August 26th._—This morning found us again on the southern side of the

river, off Santarem, at the mouth of one of the great branches of the

Amazons, the Tapajoz. Here we leave a number of our party. Mr. Dexter,

Mr. James, and Mr. Talisman, a young Brazilian who joined our party at

Pará, go on a collecting expedition up the Tapajoz. Mr. Bourget and Mr.

Hunnewell remain at Santarem, the former to make collections, the latter

to attend to the repairs of his photographing apparatus, which has met

with some disasters. We are all to meet again at Manaos for our farther

voyage up to Tabatinga.[57] We remained at Santarem only long enough to

see the party fitted out with a canoe and the necessary supplies, and as

they put off from the steamer we weighed anchor and proceeded on our

way, reserving our visit to Santarem for our return. As we left the port

the black waters of the Tapajoz met the yellow stream of the Amazons,

and the two ran together for a while, like the waters of the Arve and

Rhone in Switzerland, meeting but not mingling. Instead of returning at

once to the main river, the Captain, who omits nothing which can add to

the pleasure or the profit of our voyage, put the steamer through a

narrow channel, which, on the Mississippi, would be called a “bayou,”

but goes here by the name of an “Igarapé.” Nothing could be prettier

than this “Igarapé Assú,” hardly more than wide enough to admit the

steamer, and bordered on either side by a thick wood, in which are

conspicuous the Munguba, with its oval, red fruit, the Imbauba-tree,

neither so lofty nor so regular in form as about Rio, and the Taxi, with

its masses of white flowers and brown buds. For two days past we have

lost the palms in a great degree; about Monte Alégre they were

comparatively few, and here we see scarcely any.

The shore between Santarem and Obydos, where we shall arrive this

evening, seems more populous than the regions we have been passing

through. As we coast along, keeping close to the land, the scenes revive

all our early visions of an ancient pastoral life. Groups of

Indians—men, women, and children—greet us from the shore, standing under

the overarching trees, usually trained or purposely chosen to form a

kind of arbor over the landing-place,—the invariable foreground of the

picture, with the “montaria” moored in front. One or two hammocks are

often slung in the trees, and between the branches one gets a glimpse of

the thatched roof and walls of the little straw cottage behind. Perhaps

if we were to look a little closer at these pictures of pastoral life,

we should find they have a coarse and prosaic side. But let them stand.

Arcadia itself would not bear a too minute scrutiny, nor could it

present a fairer aspect than do these Indian homes on the banks of the

Amazons. The primitive forest about the houses is usually cleared, and

they stand in the midst of little plantations of the cacáo-tree, mingled

with the mandioca shrub, from the roots of which the Indians make their

flour, and occasionally also with the India-rubber-tree, though, as the

latter grows plentifully in the forest, it is not often cultivated. The

cacáo and the India-rubber they send to Pará, in exchange for such

domestic goods as they require. We have passed so close to the shore

to-day that it has been easy to make geological observations from the

deck. For a considerable distance above Santarem we have followed drift

cliffs, resting upon sandstone; the drift of the same reddish color, and

pasty, clayey consistence, and the sandstone seemingly the same in

character, as that of Monte Alégre.

_August 27th._—Villa Bella. Last evening we stopped to wood at the town

of Obydos, but without landing; keeping straight on to this port, on the

southern side of the river, at the mouth of the river Tupinambaranas.

Here we were very cordially received by Dr. Marcus, an old correspondent

of Mr. Agassiz, who has several times sent specimens from the Amazons to

the Cambridge Museum. To-night we are to start in canoes on an excursion

to some of the lakes in the neighborhood of this port.

_August 28th._—In the porch of an Indian house on the lake José Assú. We

passed a pleasant day yesterday at the house of Dr. Marcus, keeping the

Sabbath rather after the Jewish than the Christian rule, as a veritable

day of rest, lounging in hammocks, and the gentlemen smoking. We

returned to the steamer at five o’clock, intending to start at six, in

order to have the benefit of the night fishing, said to be always the

most successful. But a violent thunder-storm, with heavy rain, lasting

almost till midnight, delayed our departure. We loaded the boats,

however, before night, that we might be ready to start whenever the

weather should clear. We have two canoes, in one of which Mr. Agassiz,

myself, and Mr. Burkhardt have our quarters, while Major Coutinho, Dr.

Marcus, who accompanies us, and Mr. Thayer occupy the other. The former,

which is rather the larger of the two, has a tiny cabin at one end, some

three feet high and six feet long, roofed in with wood; the other has

also one end covered in, but with thatch instead of wood. In the larger

boat we have our luggage, compressed to the utmost, the live stock,—a

small sheep, a turkey, and several fowls,—besides a number of barrels

and kegs, containing alcohol, for specimens. The Captain has supplied us

not only with all the necessaries, but, so far as is possible, with

every luxury, for a week’s voyage. All our preparations being made, and

no prospect of clear weather, at nine o’clock we betook ourselves to our

hammocks,—or those of us who had stowed their hammocks out of reach,—to

chairs and benches, and had a broken sleep till three o’clock. The stars

were then shining, and everything looked fair for our voyage. The wind

had gone down, the river was smooth as glass when we paddled away from

the side of the steamer, and, though we had no moon, one or two planets

threw a bright reflection across the water to cheer our way. After

keeping for some time down the river, we turned, just at dawn, into a

very narrow channel leading through the forest. It was hardly day, but

perhaps the scene was none the less impressive for the dim half-light in

which we saw it. From the verdant walls, which rose on either side and

shut us in, lofty trees, clothed from base to summit in vines, stood out

here and there like huge green columns, in bold relief against the

morning sky; hidden flowers filled the air with fragrance, great roots

stretched out into the water, and now and then a floating log narrowed

the passage so as just to leave room for the canoe to pass. After a

while a broader, fuller light shone under the boughs, and we issued from

this narrow pathway into an extensive lake. Here it was found that the

large net, which was to have made a part of the outfit of the canoe, had

been left behind, and, after calling at two or three Indian houses to

see if we could supply the deficiency, we were obliged to send back to

Villa Bella for it. In the mean time we moored our boats at the foot of

a little hill, on which stands an Indian house, where we stopped to

breakfast, and where we are still waiting for the return of our

messengers. I must say, that a near view of Arcadia tends to dispel

illusions; but it should be added, that this specimen is by no means a

favorable one. The houses at Tajapurú were far more attractive, and the

appearance of their inhabitants much neater and more respectable, than

those of our friends here. Yet at this moment the scene is not

altogether uninviting. Some of the party are lounging in the hammocks,

which we have slung under the great porch, as we are to pass several

hours here; an improvised rustic table, consisting of a board resting on

forked sticks, stands at one side; the boatmen are clearing away the

remains of our late repast; the Indian women, dirty, half clad, with

their hair hanging uncombed around their faces, are tending their naked

children, or kneading the mandioca in a huge trough. The men of the

house have just returned from fishing, the morning having been more

successful in that respect than was expected, and are now fitting up a

rough forge, in which they are repairing some of their iron instruments.

In the mean time Science has its sacred corner, where Mr. Agassiz is

investigating new species, the result of the morning’s fishing, while

Mr. Burkhardt is drawing them.

_August 29th._—Finding yesterday that our shelter grew more

uncomfortable as the day wore on, and being obliged to wait for the

night fishing, we determined to cross the lake to a “Sitio” (as the

inhabitants call their plantations) on the other side of the lake. Here

we found one of the better specimens of Indian houses. On one side of

the house is the open porch, quite gay at this moment with our brightly

colored hammocks; adjoining this is a large chamber, opening into the

porch by a wide straw, or rather palm-leaf door; which does not swing on

hinges, however, but is taken down and put up like a mat. On the other

side of the room is an unglazed window, closed at will in the same way

by a palm-leaf mat. For the present this chamber is given up to my use.

On the other side of the porch is another veranda-like room, also open

at the sides, and apparently the working-room of the family; for here is

the great round oven, built of mud, where the farinha is dried, and the

baskets of mandioca-root are standing ready to be picked and grated, and

here also is the rough log table where we take our meals. Everything has

an air of decency and cleanliness; the mud-floors are swept, the ground

about the house is tidy and free from rubbish, the little plantation

around it of cacáo and mandioca, with here and there a coffee-shrub, is

in nice order. The house stands on a slightly rising ground, sloping

gently upward from the lake, and just below, under some trees on the

shore, are moored the Indian’s “Montaria” and our two canoes. We were

received with the most cordial friendliness, the Indian women gathering

about me and examining, though not in a rough or rude way, my dress, the

net on my hair, touching my rings and watch-chain, and evidently

discussing the “branca” between themselves. In the evening, after

dinner, I walked up and down outside the house, enjoying the

picturesqueness of the scene. The husband had just come in from the

lake, and the fire on the ground, over which the fresh fish was broiling

for the supper of the family, shone on the figures of the women and

children as they moved about, and shed its glow under the thatched roof

of the working-room, making its interior warm and ruddy; a lantern in

the corner of the porch threw a dim, uncertain light over hammocks and

half-recumbent figures, and without, the moon shone over lake and

forest. The mosquitoes, however, presently began to disturb the romance

of the scene, and, as we were all rather tired from our broken rest the

night before, we retired early. My own sleep, under an excellent

mosquito-net, was very quiet and refreshing, but there were some of the

party who had not provided themselves with this indispensable

accompaniment of a hammock, and they passed the night in misery,

affording a repast to the voracious hordes buzzing about them. I was

awakened shortly after daylight by the Indian women, bringing me a

bouquet of roses and jessamine from the vines which grew about the

cottage, and wishing me good morning. After such a kindly greeting, I

could not refuse them the pleasure of assisting at my toilet, of

watching the opening of my valise, and handling every article as it came

out.

The night fishing was unfavorable, but this morning the fishermen have

brought in new species enough to keep Mr. Agassiz and his artist busy

for many hours, so that we are likely to pass another night among these

hospitable people. I must say that the primitive life of the better

class of Indians on the Amazons is much more attractive than the

so-called civilized life in the white settlements. Anything more bald,

dreary, and uninviting than life in the Amazonian towns, with an attempt

at the conventionalisms of civilization, but without one of its graces,

I can hardly conceive. This morning my Indian friends have been showing

me the various processes to which the Mandioca is subjected. This plant

is invaluable to these people. It gives them their farinha,—a coarse

kind of flour, their only substitute for bread,—their tapioca, and also

a kind of fermented juice called tucupi,—a more questionable blessing,

perhaps, since it affords them the means of getting intoxicated. After

being peeled, the roots of the mandioca are scraped on a very coarse

grater; in this condition they make a moist kind of paste, which is then

packed in elastic straw tubes, made of the fibres of the Jacitará Palm

(Desmonchus). When her tube, which has always a loop at either end, is

full, the Indian woman hangs it on the branch of a tree; she then passes

a pole through the lower loop and into a hole in the trunk of the tree,

and, sitting down on the other end of the pole, she thus transforms it

into a primitive kind of lever, drawing out the tube to its utmost

length by the pressure of her own weight. The juice is thus expressed,

flowing into a bowl placed under the tube. This juice is poisonous at

first, but after being fermented becomes quite harmless, and is then

used for the tucupi. The tapioca is made by mixing the grated mandioca

with water. It is then pressed on a sieve, and the fluid which flows out

is left to stand. It soon makes a deposit like starch, and when hardened

they make it into a kind of porridge. It is a favorite article of food

with them.