[Illustration]
The approach to the coast, near Bluefields, holds out no delusions. The
shore is flat, and in all respects tame and uninteresting. A white line
of sand, a green belt of trees, with no relief except here and there a
solitary palm, and a few blue hills in the distance, are the only objects
which are offered to the expectant eyes of the voyager. A nearer approach
reveals a large lagoon, protected by a narrow belt of sand, covered, on
the inner side, with a dense mass of mangrove trees; and this is the
harbor of Bluefields. The entrance is narrow, but not difficult, at the
foot of a high, rocky bluff, which completely commands the passage.
The town, or rather the collection of huts called by that name, lies
nearly nine miles from the entrance. After much tacking, and backing,
and filling, to avoid the innumerable banks and shallows in the lagoon,
we finally arrived at the anchorage. We had hardly got our anchor down,
before we were boarded by a very pompous black man, dressed in a shirt
of red check, pantaloons of white cotton cloth, and a glazed straw hat,
with feet innocent of shoes, whose office nobody knew, further than that
he was called “Admiral Rodney,” and was an important functionary in the
“Mosquito Kingdom.” He bustled about, in an extraordinary way, but his
final purpose seemed narrowed down to getting a dram, and pocketing a
couple of dollars, slily slipped into his hand by the captain, just
before he got over the side. When he had left, we were told that we could
go on shore.
Bluefields is an imperial city, the residence of the court of the
Mosquito Kingdom, and therefore merits a particular description. As I
have said, it is a collection of the rudest possible thatched huts. Among
them are two or three framed buildings, one of which is the residence
of a Mr. Bell, an Englishman, with whom, as I afterwards learned,
resided that world-renowned monarch, “George William Clarence, King of
all the Mosquitos.” The site of the huts is picturesque, being upon
comparatively high ground, at a point where a considerable stream from
the interior enters the lagoon. There are two villages; the principal
one, or Bluefields proper, which is much the largest, containing perhaps
five hundred people; and “Carlsruhe,” a kind of dependency, so named by
a colony of Prussians who had attempted to establish themselves here,
but whose colony, at the time of my visit, had utterly failed. Out of
more than a hundred of the poor people, who had been induced to come
here, but three or four were left, existing in a state of great debility
and distress. Most of their companions had died, but a few had escaped
to the interior, where they bear convincing witness to the wickedness of
attempting to found colonies, from northern climates, on low, pestiferous
shores, under the tropics.
Among the huts were many palm and plantain trees, with detached stalks of
the papaya, laden with its large golden fruit. The shore was lined with
canoes, _pitpans_ and _dories_, hollowed from the trunks of trees, all
sharp, trim, and graceful in shape. The natives propel them, with great
rapidity, by single broad-bladed paddles, struck vertically in the water,
first on one side, and then on the other.[1]
There was a large assemblage on the beach, when we landed, but I was
amazed to find that, with few exceptions, they were all unmitigated
negros, or Sambos (_i. e._ mixed negro and Indian). I had heard of the
Mosquito shore as occupied by the Mosquito Indians, but soon found
that there were few, if any, pure Indians on the entire coast. The
miserable people who go by that name are, in reality, Sambos, having a
considerable intermixture of trader blood from Jamaica, with which island
the coast has its principal relations. The arrival of the traders on
the shore is the signal for unrestrained debauchery, always preluded by
the traders baptizing, in a manner not remarkable for its delicacy or
gravity, all children born since their last visit, in whom there is any
decided indication of white blood. The names given on these occasions
are as fantastic as the ceremony, and great liberties are taken with the
cognomens of all notabilities, living and dead, from “Pompey” down to
“Wellington.”
Our first concern in Bluefields was to get a roof to shelter us, which
we finally succeeded in doing, through the intervention of the captain
of the “Bolivar.” That is to say, a dilapidated negro from Jamaica,
hearing that I had just left that delectable island, claimed me as his
countryman, and gave me a little deserted thatched hut, the walls of
which were composed of a kind of wicker work of upright canes, interwoven
with palm leaves. This structure had served him, in the days of his
prosperity, as a kitchen. It was not more than ten feet square, but would
admit a hammock, hung diagonally from one corner to the other. To this
abbreviated establishment, I moved my few damaged effects, and in the
course of the day, completely domesticated myself. Antonio exhibited the
greatest aptness and industry in making our quarters comfortable, and
evinced an elasticity and cheerfulness of manner unknown before. In the
evening, he responded to the latent inquiry of my looks, by saying, that
his heart had become lighter since he had reached the continent, and that
his Lord gave promise of better days.
“Look!” he exclaimed, as he held up his talisman before my eyes. It
emitted a pale light, which seemed to come from it in pulsations, or
radiating circles. It may have been fancy, but if so, I am not prepared
to say that all which we deem real is not a dream and a delusion!
My host was a man of more pretensions than Captain Ponto, but otherwise
very much of the same order of African architecture. From his cautious
silence, on the subject of his arrival on the coast, I inferred that he
had been brought out as a slave, some thirty-five or forty years ago,
when several planters from Jamaica attempted to establish themselves
here. However that may have been, he now called himself a “merchant,” and
appeared proud of a little collection of “osnaburgs,” a few red bandanna
handkerchiefs, flanked by a dingy cask of what the Yankees would call
“the rale critter,” which occupied one corner of his house or rather hut.
He brooded over these with unremitting care, although I believe I was
his only customer, (to the extent of a few fish hooks), during my stay
in Bluefields. He called himself Hodgson, (the name, as I afterwards
learned, of one of the old British superintendents,) and based his hopes
of family immortality upon a son, whom he respectfully called _Mister_
James Hodgson, and who was, he said, principal counselor to the king.
This information, communicated to me within two hours after my arrival,
led me to believe myself in the line of favorable presentation at court.
But I found out afterwards, that this promising scion of the house of
Hodgson was “under a cloud,” and had lost the sunshine of imperial
favor, in consequence of having made some most indiscreet confessions,
when taken a prisoner, a few years before, by the Nicaraguans. However,
I was not destined to pine away my days in devising plans to obtain an
introduction to his Mosquito Majesty. For, rising early on the morning
subsequent to my arrival, I started out to see the sights of Bluefields.
Following a broad path, leading to a grove of cocoa-nut trees, which
shadowed over the river, tall and trim, I met a white man, of thin and
serious visage, who eyed me curiously for a moment, bowed slightly, and
passed on in silence. The distant air of an Englishman, on meeting an
American, is generally reciprocated by equally frigid formality. So I
stared coldly, bowed stiffly, and also passed on. I smiled to think what
a deal of affectation had been wasted on both sides, for it would have
been unnatural if two white men were not glad to see each others’ faces
in a land of ebony like this. So I involuntarily turned half round, just
in time to witness a similar evolution on the part of my thin friend. It
was evident that his thoughts were but reflections of my own, and being
the younger of the two, I retraced my steps, and approached him with a
laughing “Good morning!” He responded to my salutation with an equally
pregnant “Good morning,” at the same time raising his hand to his ear, in
token of being hard of hearing. Conversation opened, and I at once found
I was in the presence of a man of superior education, large experience,
and altogether out of place in the Mosquito metropolis. After a long
walk, in which we passed a rough board structure, surmounted by a stumpy
pole, supporting a small flag—a sort of hybrid between the Union Jack
and the “Stars and Stripes”—called by Mr. Bell the “House of Justice,” I
accepted his invitation to accompany him home to coffee.
His house was a plain building of rough boards, with several small rooms,
all opening into the principal apartment, in which I was invited to sit
down. A sleepy-looking black girl, with an enormous shock of frizzled
hair, was sweeping the floor, in a languid, mechanical way, calculated to
superinduce yawning, even after a brisk morning walk. The partitions were
hung with many prints, in which “Her Most Gracious Majesty” appeared in
all the multiform glory of steel, lithograph, and chromotint. A gun or
two, a table in the corner, supporting a confused collection of books and
papers, with some ropes, boots, and iron grapnels beneath, a few chairs,
a Yankee clock, and a table, completed the furniture and decoration of
the room. I am thus particular in this inventory, for reasons which will
afterward appear.
At a word from Mr. Bell, the torpid black girl disappeared for a few
moments, and then came back with some cups and a pot of coffee. I
observed that there were three cups, and that my host filled them all,
which I thought a little singular, since there were but two of us. A
faint, momentary suspicion crossed my mind, that the female polypus stood
in some such relation to my host as to warrant her in honoring us with
her company. But, instead of doing so, she unceremoniously pushed open a
door in the corner, and curtly ejaculated to some unseen occupant, “Get
up!” There was a kind of querulous response, and directly a thumping
and muttering, as of some person who regarded himself as unreasonably
disturbed. Meanwhile we had each finished our first cup of coffee, and
were proceeding with a second, when the door in the corner opened, and a
black boy, or what an American would be apt to call, a “young darkey,”
apparently nineteen or twenty years old, shuffled up to the table. He
wore only a shirt, unbuttoned at the throat, and cotton pantaloons,
scarcely buttoned at all. He nodded to my entertainer with a drawling
“Mornin’, sir!” and sat down to the third cup of coffee. My host seemed
to take no notice of him, and we continued our conversation. Soon after,
the sloven youth got up, took his hat, and slowly walked down the path to
the river, where I afterward saw him washing his face in the stream.
As I was about leaving, Mr. Bell kindly volunteered his services to me,
in any way they might be made available. I thanked him, and suggested
that, having no object to accomplish except to “scare up” adventures and
seek out novel sights, I should be obliged to him for an introduction
to the king, at some future day, after Antonio should have succeeded in
rejuvenating my suit of ceremony, now rather rusty from saturation with
salt water. He smiled faintly, and said, as for that matter, there need
be no delay; and, stepping to the door, shouted to the black youth by
the river, and beckoned to him to come up the bank. The youth put on
his hat hurriedly, and obeyed. “Perhaps you are not aware _that_ is the
king?” observed my host, with a contemptuous smile. I made no reply, as
the youth was at hand. He took off his hat respectfully, but there was
no introduction in the case, beyond the quiet observation, “George, this
gentleman has come to see you; sit down!”
I soon saw who was the real “king” in Bluefields. “George,” I think, had
also a notion of his own on the subject, but was kept in such strict
subordination that he never manifested it by words. I found him shy, but
not without the elements of an ordinary English education, which he had
received in England. He is nothing more or less than a negro, with hardly
a perceptible trace of Indian blood, and would pass at the South for “a
likely young fellow, worth twelve hundred dollars as a body-servant!”
The second day after my arrival was Sunday, and in the forenoon, Mr.
Bell read the service of the English Church, in the “House of Justice.”
There were perhaps a dozen persons present, among them the king, who
was now dressed plainly and becomingly, and who conducted himself with
entire propriety. I could not see that he was treated with any special
consideration; while Mr. Bell received marked deference.
It is a curious fact that although the English have had relations, more
or less intimate, with this shore, ever since the pirates made it their
retreat, during the glorious days of the buccaneers, they have never
introduced the Gospel. The religion of the “kingdom” was declared by the
late king, in his will, to be “the Established Church of England,” but
the Established Church has never taken steps to bring the natives within
its aristocratic fold. Several dissenting missionaries have made attempts
to settle on the coast, but as the British officers and agents never
favored them, they have met with no success. Besides, the Sambos are
strongly attached to heathenish rites, half African and half Indian, in
which what they call “_big drunk_” is not the least remarkable feature.
Some years ago a missionary, named Pilley, arrived at Sandy Bay, for the
purpose of reclaiming the “lost sheep.” A house was found for him, and he
commenced preaching, and for a few Sundays enticed some of the leading
Sambos to hear him, by giving them each a glass of grog. At length, one
Sabbath afternoon, a considerable number of the natives attended to hear
the stranger talk, and to receive the usual spiritual consolation. But
the demijohn of the worthy minister had been exhausted. He nevertheless
sought to compensate for the deficiency by a more vehement display of
eloquence, and for a time flattered himself that he was producing a
lasting impression. His discourse, however, was suddenly interrupted by
one of the chiefs, who rose and indignantly exclaimed, “All preach—no
grog—no good!” and with a responsive “No good!” the audience followed
him, as he stalked away, leaving the astonished preacher to finish his
discourse to two or three Englishmen present.
In Bluefields the natives are kept in more restraint than elsewhere
on the coast; but even here it has been found impossible to suppress
their traditional practices, especially when connected with their
superstitions. My venerable friend Hodgson, after “service,” informed me
that a funeral was to take place, at a small settlement, a few miles up
the river, and volunteered to escort me thither in his pitpan, if Antonio
would undertake to do the paddling. The suggestion was very acceptable,
and after a very frugal dinner, on roast fish and boiled plantains, we
set out. But we were not alone; we found dozens of pitpans starting for
the same destination, filled with men and women. It is impossible to
imagine a more picturesque spectacle than these light and graceful boats,
with occupants dressed in the brightest colors, darting over the placid
waters of the river, now gay in the sunlight, and anon sobered in the
shadows of the trees which studded the banks. There was a keen strife
among the rowers, who, amid shouts and screeches, in which both men and
women joined, exerted themselves to the utmost. Even Antonio smiled at
the scene, but it was half contemptuously, for he maintained, in respect
to these mongrels, the reserve of conscious superiority.
[Illustration: GOING TO THE FUNERAL.]
Less than an hour brought us in view of a little collection of huts,
grouped on the shore, under the shadow of a cluster of palm-trees, which,
from a distance, presented a picture of entrancing beauty. A large group
of natives had already collected on the shore, and, as we came near, we
heard the monotonous beating of the native drum, or _tum-tum_, relieved
by an occasional low, deep blast on a large hollow pipe, which sounded
more like the distant bellowing of an ox than any thing else I ever
heard. In the pauses, we distinguished suppressed wails, which continued
for a minute perhaps, and were then followed by the monotonous drum and
droning pipe. The descriptions of similar scenes in Central Africa,
given to us by Clapperton and Mungo Park, recurred to me with wonderful
vividness, and left the impression that the ceremonies going on were
rather African than American in their origin.
On advancing to the huts, and the centre of the group, I found a small
pitpan cut in half, in one part of which, wrapped in cotton cloth, was
the dead body of a man of middle age, much emaciated, and horribly
disfigured by what is called the _bulpis_, a species of syphilitic
leprosy, which is almost universal on the coast, and which, with the aid
of rum, has already reduced the population to one half what it was twenty
years ago. This disgusting disease is held in such terror by the Indians
of the interior, that they have prohibited all sexual relations, between
their people and the Sambos of the coast, under the penalty of death.
[Illustration: A MOSQUITO BURIAL.]
Around the pitpan were stationed a number of women, with palm branches,
to keep off the flies, which swarmed around the already festering corpse.
Their frizzled hair started from their heads like the snakes on the brow
of the fabled Gorgon, and they swayed their bodies to and fro, keeping a
kind of tread-mill step to the measure of the doleful _tum-tum_. With
the exception of the men who beat the drum and blew the pipe, these women
appeared to be the only persons at all interested in the proceedings. The
rest were standing in groups, or squatted at the roots of the palm-trees.
I was beginning to get tired of the performance, when, with a suddenness
which startled even the women around the corpse, four men, entirely
naked excepting a cloth wrapped round their loins, and daubed over with
variously-colored clays, rushed from the interior of one of the huts, and
hastily fastening a piece of rope to the half of the pitpan containing
the corpse, dashed away towards the woods, dragging it after them, like
a sledge. The women with the Gorgon heads, and the men with the drum and
trumpet, followed them on the run, each keeping time on his respective
instrument. The spectators all hurried after, in a confused mass, while a
big negro, catching up the remaining half of the pitpan, placed it on his
head, and trotted behind the crowd.
The men bearing the corpse entered the woods, and the mass of the
spectators, jostling each other in the narrow path, kept up the same
rapid pace. At the distance of perhaps two hundred yards, there was an
open place, covered with low, dank, tangled underbush, still wet from the
rain of the preceding night, which, although unmarked by any sign, I took
to be the burial place. When I came up, the half of the pitpan containing
the body had been put in a shallow trench. The other half was then
inverted over it. The Gorgon-headed women threw in their palm-branches,
and the painted negroes rapidly filled in the earth. While this was
going on, some men were collecting sticks and palm-branches, with which
a little hut was hastily built over the grave. In this was placed an
earthen vessel, filled with water. The turtle-spear of the dead man was
stuck deep in the ground at his head, and a fantastic fellow, with an old
musket, discharged three or four rounds over the spot.
This done, the entire crowd started back in the same manner it had come.
No sooner, however, did the painted men reach the village, than, seizing
some heavy _machetes_, they commenced cutting down the palm-trees which
stood around the hut that had been occupied by the dead Sambo. It was
done silently, in the most hasty manner, and when finished, they ran down
to the river, and plunged out of sight in the water—a kind of lustration
or purifying rite. They remained in the water a few moments, then hurried
back to the hut from which they had issued, and disappeared.
This savage and apparently unmeaning ceremony was explained to me by
Hodgson, as follows: Death is supposed by the Sambos to result from the
influences of a demon, called _Wulasha_, who, ogre-like, feeds upon the
bodies of the dead. To rescue the corpse from this fate, it is necessary
to lull the demon to sleep, and then steal away the body and bury it,
after which it is safe. To this end they bring in the aid of the drowsy
drum and droning pipe, and the women go through a slow and soothing
dance. Meanwhile, in the recesses of some hut, where they cannot be seen
by _Wulasha_, a certain number of men carefully disguise themselves, so
that they may not afterwards be recognized and tormented; and when the
demon is supposed to have been lulled to sleep, they seize the moment
to bury the body. I could not ascertain any reason for cutting down the
palm-trees, except that it had always been practiced by their ancestors.
As the palm-tree is of slow growth, it has resulted, from this custom,
that they have nearly disappeared from some parts of the coast. I could
not learn that it was the habit to plant a cocoa-nut tree upon the birth
of a child, as in some parts of Africa, where the tree receives a common
name with the infant, and the annual rings on its trunk mark his age.
If the water disappears from the earthen vessel placed on the
grave,—which, as the ware is porous, it seldom fails to do in the course
of a few days,—it is taken as evidence that it has been consumed by the
dead man, and that he has escaped the maw of _Wulasha_. This ascertained,
preparations are at once made for what is called a _Seekroe_, or Feast of
the Dead—an orgie which I afterwards witnessed higher up the coast, and
which will be described in due course.
The negroes brought originally from Jamaica, as also most of their
descendants, hold these barbarous practices in contempt, and bury their
dead, as they say, “English-gentleman fashion.” But while these practices
are discountenanced and prohibited in Bluefields proper, they are,
nevertheless, universal elsewhere on the Mosquito Shore.
I cannot omit mentioning here, that I paid a visit both to the
establishment and the burial-place of the ill-fated Prussian colony.
Many of the houses, now rotting down, had been brought out from Europe,
and all around them were wheels of carts falling in pieces, harnesses
dropping apart, and plows and instruments of cultivation rusting away,
or slowly burying themselves in the earth. They told a sad story of
ignorance on the part of the projectors of the establishment, and of the
disappointments and sufferings of their victims. The folly of attempting
to plant an agricultural colony, from the north of Europe, on low, murky,
tropical shores, is inconceivable. Again and again the attempt has been
made, on this coast, and as often it has terminated in disaster and
death. It was tried by the French at Tehuantepec and Cape Gracias; by the
English at Vera Paz and Black River; and by the Belgians and Prussians
at Santo Tomas and Bluefields. In no instance did these establishments
survive a second year, nor in a single instance did a tenth of the
poor colonists escape the grave. The Prussians at Bluefields suffered
fearfully. At one time, within four months after their arrival, out of
more than a hundred, there were not enough retaining their health to
bury the dead, much less to attend to the sick. The natives, jealous of
the strangers, would neither assist nor come near them, and absolutely
refused to sell them the scanty food requisite for their subsistence.
This feeling was rather encouraged than otherwise, by the traders on the
coast, who desired to retain the monopoly of trade, as they had always
done a preponderance of influence among the natives. They procured the
revocation of the grant which had been made to the Messrs. Shepherd
of San Juan, from whom the Prussians had purchased a doubtful title,
and threatened the stricken strangers with forcible expulsion. Death,
however, soon relieved them from taking overt measures; and, at the time
of my visit, two or three haggard wretches, whose languid blue eyes and
flaxen hair contrasted painfully with the blotched visages of the brutal
Sambos, were all that remained of the unfortunate Prussian colony. The
burying place was a small opening in the bush, where rank vines sweltered
over the sunken graves, a spot reeking with miasmatic damps, from which
I retreated with a shudder. I could wish no worse punishment to the
originators of that fatal, not to say, criminal enterprise, than that
they should stand there, as I stood, that Conscience might hiss in their
ears, “Behold thy work!”