all to no purpose. I was now convinced that something was materially
wrong. We ought to have been successful, considering our vigilance and
attention, and that we had repeatedly seen the cayman. It was useless
to tarry here any longer; moreover, the coloured man began to take
airs, and fancied that I could not do without him. I never admit of
this in any expedition where I am commander; and so I convinced the
man, to his sorrow, that I could do without him, for I paid him what I
had agreed to give him, which amounted to eight dollars, and ordered
him back in his own curial to Mrs. Peterson's, on the hill at the first
falls. I then asked the negro if there were any Indian settlements in
the neighbourhood; he said he knew of one, a day and a half off. We
went in quest of it, and about one o'clock the next day the negro
showed us the creek where it was.
The entrance was so concealed by thick bushes that a stranger would
have passed it without knowing it to be a creek. In going up it we
found it dark, winding, and intricate beyond any creek that I had ever
seen before. When Orpheus came back with his young wife from Styx his
path must have been similar to this, for Ovid says it was
Arduus, obliquus, caligine densus opaca,
and this creek was exactly so.
When we had got about two-thirds up it we met the Indians going
a-fishing. I saw by the way their things were packed in the curial that
they did not intend to return for some days. However, on telling them
what we wanted, and by promising handsome presents of powder, shot and
hooks, they dropped their expedition and invited us up to the
settlement they had just left, and where we laid in a provision of
cassava.
They gave us for dinner boiled ant-bear and red monkey: two dishes
unknown even at Beauvilliers in Paris or at a London city feast. The
monkey was very good indeed, but the ant-bear had been kept beyond its
time: it stunk as our venison does in England; and so, after tasting
it, I preferred dining entirely on monkey. After resting here we went
back to the river. The Indians, three in number, accompanied us in
their own curial, and, on entering the river, pointed to a place a
little way above well calculated to harbour a cayman. The water was
deep and still, and flanked by an immense sandbank; there was also a
little shallow creek close by.
On this sandbank, near the forest, the people made a shelter for the
night. My own was already made, for I always take with me a painted
sheet about twelve feet by ten. This thrown over a pole, supported
betwixt two trees, makes you a capital roof with very little trouble.
We showed one of the Indians the shark-hook. He shook his head and
laughed at it, and said it would not do. When he was a boy he had seen
his father catch the caymen, and on the morrow he would make something
that would answer.
In the meantime we set the shark-hook, but it availed us naught: a
cayman came and took it, but would not swallow it.
Seeing it was useless to attend the shark-hook any longer, we left it
for the night and returned to our hammocks.
Ere I fell asleep a reflection or two broke in upon me. I considered
that as far as the judgment of civilised man went, everything had been
procured and done to ensure success. We had hooks and lines and baits
and patience; we had spent nights in watching, had seen the cayman come
and take the bait, and after our expectations had been wound up to the
highest pitch all ended in disappointment. Probably this poor wild man
of the woods would succeed by means of a very simple process, and thus
prove to his more civilised brother that, notwithstanding books and
schools, there is a vast deal of knowledge to be picked up at every
step, whichever way we turn ourselves.
In the morning, as usual, we found the bait gone from the shark-hook.
The Indians went into the forest to hunt, and we took the canoe to
shoot fish and get another supply of turtle's eggs, which we found in
great abundance on this large sandbank.
We went to the little shallow creek, and shot some young caymen about
two feet long. It was astonishing to see what spite and rage these
little things showed when the arrow struck them; they turned round and
bit it: and snapped at us when we went into the water to take them up.
Daddy Quashi boiled one of them for his dinner, and found it very sweet
and tender. I do not see why it should not be as good as frog or veal.
The day was now declining apace, and the Indian had made his instrument
to take the cayman. It was very simple. There were four pieces of
tough, hardwood a foot long, and about as thick as your little finger,
and barbed at both ends; they were tied round the end of the rope in
such a manner that if you conceive the rope to be an arrow, these four
sticks would form the arrow's head; so that one end of the four united
sticks answered to the point of the arrowhead, while the other end of
the sticks expanded at equal distances round the rope, thus:
[Illustration]
Now it is evident that, if the cayman swallowed this (the other end of
the rope, which was thirty yards long, being fastened to a tree), the
more he pulled the faster the barbs would stick into his stomach. This
wooden hook, if you may so call it, was well-baited with the flesh of
the acouri, and the entrails were twisted round the rope for about a
foot above it.
Nearly a mile from where we had our hammocks the sandbank was steep and
abrupt, and the river very still and deep; there the Indian pricked a
stick into the sand. It was two feet long, and on its extremity was
fixed the machine: it hung suspended about a foot from the water, and
the end of the rope was made fast to a stake driven well into the sand.
The Indian then took the empty shell of a land-tortoise and gave it
some heavy blows with an axe. I asked why he did that. He said it was
to let the cayman hear that something was going on. In fact, the Indian
meant it as the cayman's dinner-bell.
[Illustration: cayman bait]
Having done this we went back to the hammocks, not intending to visit
it again till morning. During the night the jaguars roared and grumbled
in the forest as though the world was going wrong with them, and at
intervals we could hear the distant cayman. The roaring of the jaguars
was awful, but it was music to the dismal noise of these hideous and
malicious reptiles.
About half-past five in the morning the Indian stole off silently to
take a look at the bait. On arriving at the place he set up a
tremendous shout. We all jumped out of our hammocks and ran to him. The
Indians got there before me, for they had no clothes to put on, and I
lost two minutes in looking for my trousers and in slipping into them.
We found a cayman ten feet and a half long fast to the end of the rope.
Nothing now remained to do but to get him out of the water without
injuring his scales: "hoc opus, hic labor." We mustered strong: there
were three Indians from the creek, there was my own Indian Yan, Daddy
Quashi, the negro from Mrs. Peterson's, James, Mr. R. Edmonstone's man,
whom I was instructing to preserve birds, and lastly myself.
I informed the Indians that it was my intention to draw him quietly out
of the water and then secure him. They looked and stared at each other,
and said I might do it myself, but they would have no hand in it; the
cayman would worry some of us. On saying this, "consedere duces," they
squatted on their hams with the most perfect indifference.
The Indians of these wilds have never been subject to the least
restraint, and I knew enough of them to be aware that if I tried to
force them against their will they would take off and leave me and my
presents unheeded, and never return.
Daddy Quashi was for applying to our guns, as usual, considering them
our best and safest friends. I immediately offered to knock him down
for his cowardice, and he shrunk back, begging that I would be
cautious, and not get myself worried, and apologising for his own want
of resolution. My Indian was now in conversation with the others, and
they asked if I would allow them to shoot a dozen arrows into him, and
thus disable him. This would have ruined all. I had come above three
hundred miles on purpose to get a cayman uninjured, and not to carry
back a mutilated specimen. I rejected their proposition with firmness,
and darted a disdainful eye upon the Indians.
Daddy Quashi was again beginning to remonstrate, and I chased him on
the sandbank for a quarter of a mile. He told me afterwards he thought
he should have dropped down dead with fright, for he was firmly
persuaded if I had caught him I should have bundled him into the
cayman's jaws. Here, then, we stood in silence like a calm before a
thunderstorm. "Hoc res summa loco. Scinditur in contraria vulgus." They
wanted to kill him, and I wanted to take him alive.
I now walked up and down the sand, revolving a dozen projects in my
head. The canoe was at a considerable distance, and I ordered the
people to bring it round to the place where we were. The mast was eight
feet long, and not much thicker than my wrist. I took it out of the
canoe and wrapped the sail round the end of it. Now it appeared clear
to me that, if I went down upon one knee and held the mast in the same
position as the soldier holds his bayonet when rushing to the charge, I
could force it down the cayman's throat should he come open-mouthed at
me. When this was told to the Indians they brightened up, and said they
would help me to pull him out of the river.
"Brave squad!" said I to myself. "'Audax omnia perpeti,' now that you
have got me betwixt yourselves and danger." I then mustered all hands
for the last time before the battle. We were four South American
savages, two negroes from Africa, a creole from Trinidad, and myself a
white man from Yorkshire. In fact, a little tower of Babel group, in
dress, no dress, address, and language.
Daddy Quashi hung in the rear. I showed him a large Spanish knife which
I always carried in the waistband of my trousers: it spoke volumes to
him, and he shrugged up his shoulders in absolute despair. The sun was
just peeping over the high forests on the eastern hills, as if coming
to look on and bid us act with becoming fortitude. I placed all the
people at the end of the rope, and ordered them to pull till the cayman
appeared on the surface of the water, and then, should he plunge, to
slacken the rope and let him go again into the deep.
I now took the mast of the canoe in my hand (the sail being tied round
the end of the mast) and sunk down upon one knee, about four yards from
the water's edge, determining to thrust it down his throat in case he
gave me an opportunity. I certainly felt somewhat uncomfortable in this
situation, and I thought of Cerberus on the other side of the Styx
ferry. The people pulled the cayman to the surface; he plunged
furiously as soon as he arrived in these upper regions, and immediately
went below again on their slackening the rope. I saw enough not to fall
in love at first sight. I now told them we would run all risks and have
him on land immediately. They pulled again, and out he came--"monstrum
horrendum, informe." This was an interesting moment. I kept my position
firmly, with my eye fixed steadfast on him.
By the time the cayman was within two yards of me I saw he was in a
state of fear and perturbation. I instantly dropped the mast, sprung up
and jumped on his back, turning half round as I vaulted, so that I
gained my seat with my face in a right position. I immediately seized
his fore-legs, and by main force twisted them on his back; thus they
served me for a bridle.
He now seemed to have recovered from his surprise, and probably
fancying himself in hostile company he began to plunge furiously, and
lashed the sand with his long and powerful tail. I was out of reach of
the strokes of it by being near his head. He continued to plunge and
strike and made my seat very uncomfortable. It must have been a fine
sight for an unoccupied spectator.
The people roared out in triumph, and were so vociferous that it was
some time before they heard me tell them to pull me and my beast of
burden farther inland. I was apprehensive the rope might break, and
then there would have been every chance of going down to the regions
under water with the cayman. That would have been more perilous than
Arion's marine morning ride:
Delphini insidens vada cærula sulcat Arion.
The people now dragged us above forty yards on the sand: it was the
first and last time I was ever on a cayman's back. Should it be asked
how I managed to keep my seat, I would answer, I hunted some years with
Lord Darlington's fox-hounds.
After repeated attempts to regain his liberty the cayman gave in and
became tranquil through exhaustion. I now managed to tie up his jaws
and firmly secured his fore-feet in the position I had held them. We
had now another severe struggle for superiority, but he was soon
overcome and again remained quiet. While some of the people were
pressing upon his head and shoulders I threw myself on his tail, and by
keeping it down to the sand prevented him from kicking up another dust.
He was finally conveyed to the canoe, and then to the place where we
had suspended our hammocks. There I cut his throat; and after breakfast
was over commenced the dissection.
Now that the affray had ceased, Daddy Ouashi played a good finger and
thumb at breakfast: he said he found himself much revived, and became
very talkative and useful, as there was no longer any danger. He was a
faithful, honest negro. His master, my worthy friend Mr. Edmonstone,
had been so obliging as to send out particular orders to the colony
that the Daddy should attend me all the time I was in the forest. He
had lived in the wilds of Demerara with Mr. Edmonstone for many years,
and often amused me with the account of the frays his master had had in
the woods with snakes, wild beasts and runaway negroes. Old age was now
coming fast upon him; he had been an able fellow in his younger days,
and a gallant one, too, for he had a large scar over his eyebrow caused
by the stroke of a cutlass from another negro while the Daddy was
engaged in an intrigue.
The back of the cayman may be said to be almost impenetrable to a
musket-ball, but his sides are not near so strong, and are easily
pierced with an arrow; indeed, were they as strong as the back and the
belly, there would be no part of the cayman's body soft and elastic
enough to admit of expansion after taking in a supply of food.
The cayman has no grinders; his teeth are entirely made for snatch and
swallow: there are thirty-two in each jaw. Perhaps no animal in
existence bears more decided marks in his countenance of cruelty and
malice than the cayman. He is the scourge and terror of all the large
rivers in South America near the line.
One Sunday evening, some years ago, as I was walking with Don Felipe de
Ynciarte, Governor of Angustura, on the bank of the Oroonoque, "Stop
here a minute or two, Don Carlos," said he to me, "while I recount a
sad accident. One fine evening last year, as the people of Angustura
were sauntering up and down here in the Alameda, I was within twenty
yards of this place when I saw a large cayman rush out of the river,
seize a man, and carry him down before anybody had it in his power to
assist him. The screams of the poor fellow were terrible as the cayman
was running off with him. He plunged into the river with his prey; we
instantly lost sight of him, and never saw or heard him more."
I was a day and a half in dissecting our cayman, and then we got all
ready to return to Demerara.
It was much more perilous to descend than to ascend the falls in the
Essequibo.
The place we had to pass had proved fatal to four Indians about a month
before. The water foamed and dashed and boiled amongst the steep and
craggy rocks, and seemed to warn us to be careful how we ventured there.
I was for all hands to get out of the canoe, and then, after lashing a
long rope ahead and astern, we might have climbed from rock to rock and
tempered her in her passage down, and our getting out would have
lightened her much. But the negro who had joined us at Mrs. Peterson's
said he was sure it would be safer to stay in the canoe while she went
down the fall. I was loath to give way to him, but I did so this time
against my better judgment, as he assured me that he was accustomed to
pass and repass these falls.
Accordingly we determined to push down: I was at the helm, the rest at
their paddles. But before we got half-way through the rushing waters
deprived the canoe of all power of steerage, and she became the sport
of the torrent; in a second she was half-full of water, and I cannot
comprehend to this day why she did not go down; luckily the people
exerted themselves to the utmost, she got headway, and they pulled
through the whirlpool: I being quite in the stern of the canoe, part of
a wave struck me, and nearly knocked me overboard.
We now paddled to some rocks at a distance, got out, unloaded the canoe
and dried the cargo in the sun, which was very hot and powerful. Had it
been the wet season almost everything would have been spoiled.
After this the voyage down the Essequibo was quick and pleasant till we
reached the sea-coast: there we had a trying day of it; the wind was
dead against us, and the sun remarkably hot; we got twice aground upon
a mud-flat, and were twice obliged to get out, up to the middle in mud,
to shove the canoe through it. Half-way betwixt the Essequibo and
Demerara the tide of flood caught us, and, after the utmost exertions,
it was half-past six in the evening before we got to Georgetown.
We had been out from six in the morning in an open canoe on the
sea-coast, without umbrella or awning, exposed all day to the fiery
rays of a tropical sun. My face smarted so that I could get no sleep
during the night, and the next morning my lips were all in blisters.
The Indian Yan went down to the Essequibo a copper-colour, but the
reflection of the sun from the sea and from the sandbanks in the river
had turned him nearly black. He laughed at himself, and said the
Indians in the Demerara would not know him again. I stayed one day in
Georgetown, and then set off the next morning for headquarters in
Mibiri Creek, where I finished the cayman.
Here the remaining time was spent in collecting birds and in paying
particular attention to their haunts and economy. The rainy season
having set in, the weather became bad and stormy; the lightning and
thunder were incessant; the days cloudy, and the nights cold and misty.
I had now been eleven months in the forests, and collected some rare
insects, two hundred and thirty birds, two land-tortoises, five
armadillos, two large serpents, a sloth, an ant-bear and a cayman.
I left the wilds and repaired to Georgetown to spend a few days with
Mr. R. Edmonstone previous to embarking for Europe. I must here return
my sincerest thanks to this worthy gentleman for his many kindnesses to
me; his friendship was of the utmost service to me, and he never failed
to send me supplies up into the forest by every opportunity.
I embarked for England on board the _Dee_, West-Indiaman, commanded by
Captain Grey.
Sir Joseph Banks had often told me he hoped that I would give a lecture
in public on the new mode I had discovered of preparing specimens in
natural history for museums. I always declined to do so, as I despaired
of ever being able to hit upon a proper method of doing quadrupeds; and
I was aware that it would have been an imperfect lecture to treat of
birds only. I imparted what little knowledge I was master of at Sir
Joseph's, to the unfortunate gentlemen who went to Africa to explore
the Congo; and that was all that took place in the shape of a lecture.
Now that I had hit upon the way of doing quadrupeds, I drew up a little
plan on board the _Dee_, which I trusted would have been of service to
naturalists, and by proving to them the superiority of the new plan
they would probably be induced to abandon the old and common way, which
is a disgrace to the present age, and renders hideous every specimen in
every museum that I have as yet visited. I intended to have given three
lectures: one on insects and serpents; one on birds; and one on
quadrupeds. But, as it will be shortly seen, this little plan was
doomed not to be unfolded to public view. Illiberality blasted it in
the bud.
We had a pleasant passage across the Atlantic, and arrived in the
Mersey in fine trim and good spirits. Great was the attention I
received from the commander of the _Dee_. He and his mate, Mr. Spence,
took every care of my collection.
On our landing the gentlemen of the Liverpool Custom House received me
as an old friend and acquaintance, and obligingly offered their
services.
Twice before had I landed in Liverpool, and twice had I reason to
admire their conduct and liberality. They knew I was incapable of
trying to introduce anything contraband, and they were aware that I
never dreamed of turning to profit the specimens I had procured. They
considered that I had left a comfortable home in quest of science; and
that I had wandered into far-distant climes, and gone barefooted,
ill-clothed and ill-fed, through swamps and woods, to procure
specimens, some of which had never been seen in Europe. They considered
that it would be difficult to fix a price upon specimens which had
never been bought or sold, and which never were to be, as they were
intended to ornament my own house. It was hard, they said, to have
exposed myself for years to danger, and then be obliged to pay on
returning to my native land. Under these considerations they fixed a
moderate duty which satisfied all parties.
However, this last expedition ended not so. It taught me how hard it is
to learn the grand lesson, "æquam memento rebus in arduis, servare
mentem."
But my good friends in the Custom House of Liverpool were not to blame.
On the contrary, they did all in their power to procure balm for me
instead of rue. But it would not answer.
They appointed a very civil officer to attend me to the ship. While we
were looking into some of the boxes to see that the specimens were
properly stowed, previous to their being conveyed to the king's depôt,
another officer entered the cabin. He was an entire stranger to me, and
seemed wonderfully aware of his own consequence. Without preface or
apology he thrust his head over my shoulder and said we had no business
to have opened a single box without his permission. I answered they had
been opened almost every day since they had come on board, and that I
considered there was no harm in doing so.
He then left the cabin, and I said to myself as he went out, I suspect
I shall see that man again at Philippi. The boxes, ten in number, were
conveyed in safety from the ship to the depôt. I then proceeded to the
Custom House. The necessary forms were gone through, and a
proportionate duty, according to circumstances, was paid.
This done, we returned from the Custom House to the depôt, accompanied
by several gentlemen who wished to see the collection. They expressed
themselves highly gratified. The boxes were closed, and nothing now
remained but to convey them to the cart, which was in attendance at the
door of the depôt. Just as one of the inferior officers was carrying a
box thither, in stepped the man whom I suspected I should see again at
Philippi. He abruptly declared himself dissatisfied with the valuation
which the gentlemen of the customs had put upon the collection, and
said he must detain it. I remonstrated, but it was all in vain.
After this pitiful stretch of power and bad compliment to the other
officers of the customs, who had been satisfied with the valuation,
this man had the folly to take me aside, and after assuring me that he
had a great regard for the arts and sciences, he lamented that
conscience obliged him to do what he had done, and he wished he had
been fifty miles from Liverpool at the time that it fell to his lot to
detain the collection. Had he looked in my face as he said this he
would have seen no marks of credulity there.
I now returned to the Custom House, and after expressing my opinion of
the officer's conduct at the depôt, I pulled a bunch of keys (which
belonged to the detained boxes) out of my pocket, laid them on the
table, took my leave of the gentlemen present, and soon after set off
for Yorkshire.
I saved nothing from the grasp of the stranger officer but a pair of
live Malay fowls, which a gentleman in Georgetown had made me a present
of. I had collected in the forest several eggs of curious birds in
hopes of introducing the breed into England, and had taken great pains
in doing them over with gum arabic, and in packing them in charcoal,
according to a receipt I had seen in the gazette from the _Edinburgh
Philosophical Journal_. But these were detained in the depôt, instead
of being placed under a hen; which utterly ruined all my hopes of
rearing a new species of birds in England. Titled personages in London
interested themselves in behalf of the collection, but all in vain. And
vain also were the public and private representations of the first
officer of the Liverpool Custom House in my favour.