RIO DE JANEIRO.
One word about Rio de Janeiro. Rio, as it is generally called, is
perhaps one of the most lovely spots in the world. The beautiful natural
bay and harbour are unequalled throughout the whole universe. Still,
like the Bosphorus, the finest effect is made by Rio de Janeiro when
looked at from the water. In the days of which I write yellow fever was
unknown; now that fearful disease kills its thousands, aye, tens of
thousands, yearly. The climate, though hot at times, is very good; in
the summer the mornings are hot to a frying heat, but the sea breeze
comes in regularly as clockwork, and when it blows everything is cool
and nice. Life is indeed a lazy existence; there is no outdoor amusement
of any kind to be had in the neighbourhood. As to shooting, there are
only a few snipe to be found here and there, and while looking for these
you must beware of snakes and other venomous reptiles, which abound
both in the country and in town. I remember a terrible fright a large
picnic party, at which I assisted, was thrown into while lunching in the
garden of a villa, almost in the town of Rio, by a lady jumping up from
her seat with a deadly whip-snake hanging on her dress. I once myself
sat on an adder who put his fangs through the woollen stuff of my
inexpressibles and could not escape. The same thing happened with the
lady's dress; in that case also we caught the snake, as it could not
disentangle its fangs.
In the country near Rio there are great snakes called the anaconda, a
sort of boa-constrictor on a large scale. Once, while walking in the
woods with some friends, we found a little Indian boy dead on the
ground, one of these big snakes lying within a foot or so of him, also
dead; the snake had a poisoned arrow in his brain, which evidently had
been shot at him by the poor little boy, whose blow-pipe was lying by
his side. The snake must have struck the boy before it died, as we found
a wound on the boy's neck. This reptile measured twenty-two feet in
length.
By the way, a well-known author, Mrs. B----, tells a marvellous story
about these snakes. She says that they always go in pairs, have great
affection for each other, and are prepared on all occasions to resent
affronts offered to either of them. She narrates that a peasant once
killed a big anaconda, and that the other, or chum snake, followed the
man several miles to the house where he had taken the dead one, got in
by the window, and crushed the destroyer of his friend to death. I
expect that some salt is necessary to swallow this tale, but such is the
statement Mrs. B---- makes.
The most lovely birds and butterflies are found near Rio, and the finest
collections in the world are made there. The white people are Portuguese
by origin--not a nice lot to my fancy, though the ladies are as usual
always nice, especially when young; they get old very soon through
eating sweets and not taking exercise. There is very little poverty
except among the free blacks, who are lazy and idle and somewhat
vicious. I always have believed that the black man is an inferior
animal--in fact, that the dark races are meant to be drawers of water
and hewers of wood. I do not deny that they have souls to be saved, but
I believe that their rôle in this world is to attend on the white man.
The black is, and for years has been, educated on perfect equality with
the white man, and has had every chance of improving himself--with what
result? You could almost count on your fingers the names of those who
have distinguished themselves in the battle of life.
Sometimes, while cruising off the coast of Rio de Janeiro looking out
for slave vessels, we passed a very monotonous life. The long and
fearfully hot mornings before the sea breeze sets in, the still longer
and choking nights with the thermometer at 108°, were trying in the
extreme to those accustomed to the fresh air of northern climates; but
sailors have always something of the 'Mark Tapley' about them and are
generally jolly under all circumstances, and so it was with me. One day,
while longing for something to do, I discovered that the crew had been
ordered to paint the ship outside; as a pastime I put on old clothes and
joined the painting party. Planks were hung round the ship by ropes
being tied to each end of the plank; on these the men stood to do their
work. We had not been employed there very long when there was a cry from
the deck that the ship was surrounded by sharks. It seems that the
butcher had killed a sheep, whose entrails, having been thrown
overboard, attracted these fearful brutes round the ship in great
numbers. As may be imagined, this report created a real panic among the
painters, for I believe we all feared a shark more than an enemy armed
to the teeth. I at once made a hurried movement to get off my plank. As
I did so the rope at one end slipped off, and so threw the piece of
wood, to which I had to hang as on a rope, up and down the vessel's
side, bringing my feet to within a very few inches of the water. On
looking downwards I saw a great shark in the water, almost within
snapping distance of my legs. I can swear that my hair stood on end with
fear; though I held on like grim death, I felt myself going, yes, going,
little by little right into the beast's jaws. At that moment, only just
in time, a rope was thrown over my head from the deck above me, and I
was pulled from my fearfully perilous position, more dead than alive.
Now for revenge on the brutes who would have eaten me if they could! It
was a dead calm, the sharks were still swimming round the ship waiting
for their prey. We got a lot of hooks with chains attached to them, on
which we put baits of raw meat. I may as well mention a fact not
generally known, viz., that a shark must turn on his back before opening
his capacious mouth sufficiently to feed himself; when he turns he means
business, and woe to him who is within reach of the man-eater's jaws. On
this occasion what we offered them was merely a piece of meat, and most
ravenously did they rush, turn on their backs, and swallow it, only to
find that they were securely hooked, and could not bite through the
chains that were fast to the hooks--in fact, that it was all up with
them. Orders had been given by the commanding officer that the sharks
were not to be pulled on board, partly from the dangerous action of
their tails and jaws even when half dead, partly on account of the
confusion they make while floundering about the decks; so we hauled them
close to the top of the water, fired a bullet into their brains and cut
them loose. We killed thirty that morning in this way, some of them
eight to ten feet long.
The most horrid thing I know is to see, as I have done on more than one
occasion, a man taken by a shark. You hear a fearful scream as the poor
wretch is dragged down, and nothing remains to tell the dreadful tale
excepting that the water is deeply tinged with blood on the spot where
the unfortunate man disappeared. These ravenous man-eaters scent blood
from an enormous distance, and their prominent upper fin, which is
generally out of the water as they go along at a tremendous pace, may be
seen at a great distance, and they can swim at the rate of a mile a
minute. A shark somewhat reminds me of the torpedo of the present day,
and in my humble opinion is much more dangerous.
Once we caught a large shark. On opening him we found in his inside a
watch and chain quite perfect. Could it have been that some poor wretch
had been swallowed and digested, and the watch only remained as being
indigestible?
It is strange to see the contempt with which the black man treats a
shark, the more especially when he has to do with him in shallow water.
A negro takes a large knife and diving under the shark cuts its bowels
open. If the water is deep the shark can go lower down than the man and
so save himself, and if the nigger don't take care he will eat him; thus
the black man never goes into deep water if he can help it, for he is
always expecting a shark.