PARNAGUÁ TO NATIVIDADE.
Leaves Parnaguá—Arrives at Saco do Tanque—Carrapatos a great
pest to Travellers and Cattle—Vegetation of the Country—Crosses
the Serras da Batalha and de Mato Grosso, the boundary of
the Province of Piauhy—Descends into the district of Rio
Preto—Account of the Cherente Indians—Arrives at Santa
Rosa—Crosses the River Preto—Reaches the desolate Region of
Os Geräes—Passes over the elevated table-land Chapada da
Mangabeira—Arrives at the Indian Mission of Duro—Description
of these Indians—Reaches Cachoeira—Crosses the Serra do
Duro—Fords the River Manoel Alves—Arrives at Almas—Galheiro
Morto—Morhinos—Abundance of Wild Honey—Description of several
kinds of Bees—Reaches Nossa Senhora d’Amparo—Mato Virgem—Goître
not uncommon—Passes Sociedade—Arraial da Chapada—And arrives at
Natividade.
It was with much difficulty that I procured in Parnaguá a person to
replace the soldier who accompanied us from Oeiras; chance threw in my
way a mulatto, who having come with a large drove of cattle from the
province of Goyaz, was therefore acquainted with the tracks through the
unfrequented country into which we were now about to enter. We left
Parnaguá on the 29th of September, and continuing our journey nearly
in a southerly direction, we arrived at a little fazenda, called Saco
do Tanque, on the 7th of October, the distance being about twenty-six
leagues. It was late in the afternoon when we left Parnaguá, and being
nearly dark by the time we reached the head of the lake, we halted there
for the night under some trees. Towards morning we felt so chilly in our
hammocks, that we were glad to get up and warm ourselves at a large fire,
which the men kept burning all night. As we rode along the side of the
lake, we saw several capivaras and alligators, which upon our coming
near them made for the water.
Shortly after leaving Oeiras, we began to be much tormented by a species
of tick, to which the Brazilians give the name of carrapato. These
insects abound in dry bushy places, where they attach themselves to the
slender twigs; at first they are very small (carrapatos miudos), and may
be seen in clusters consisting of many hundreds; these as soon as any
animal passes by and touches them, instantly adhere to it, burying their
suckers so deeply into its skin, that it is only by using considerable
force they can be withdrawn. If not taken off they go on increasing
in bulk till they become as large, and even larger, than a common
horse-bean; they even increase in size on the grass and bushes, but then
have a lean flat appearance; it is to this form that the name carrapato
grande is given. Spix and Martius believe the large and small kinds to
be distinct species, but I think there can be no doubt that they are the
same insects in different stages; St. Hilare is of this opinion, and
so are the inhabitants themselves. It is only in the beginning of the
dry season that the small carrapato is to be found in those districts
which are infested by them, but as the season advances, they gradually
disappear, to be replaced by the larger ones. They attach themselves
indiscriminately to all kinds of quadrupeds, but the horse and the ox
suffer most from their attacks, and in very dry seasons they exist in
such numbers, that whole herds of cattle perish from the exhaustion which
they produce. If, however, the animal on which they live can hold out
till the rains set in, it soon regains its strength, as wet is very fatal
to the carrapato; I have frequently seen some of my horses that were
infested by these creatures, get nearly free from them after swimming
across a broad river. Some horses I found were much more subject to them
than others. We found the dry bushy country above Parnaguá swarming with
these pests, and almost every night, we had to pick hundreds of them off
our bodies before we could turn into our hammocks. The men suffered more
than either Mr. Walker or myself, as they were on foot, and their legs
were bare from the knees downwards. When I walked out to botanize in the
neighbourhood of the places where we encamped, I used generally to get
completely covered with them, and had to change my dress, but by laying
the infested articles in the bright sun-shine for a quarter of an hour
they became fit to put on again. A favourite little ring-tailed monkey,
which I obtained from an old Indian some days after we left Oeiras, also
used to suffer very much from these insects. When full grown, a large
carrapato very much resembles the ripe seed of the castor oil tree. In
dragging off very large ones, the wound which is left often becomes a
very bad sore. The carrapato belongs to the genus _Ixodes_, of Latreille.
Although the country between Parnaguá and Saco do Tanque is comparatively
level, yet there is a very perceptible rise; and although the general
vegetation has very much the same character as that of other Catinga
districts, many of the shrubs and trees were quite new to me. At this
season very few were in flower; of these, the most remarkable was a very
large tree to which the name of Sicupíra is given by the inhabitants,
and which I afterwards found extending far into the province of Goyaz;
it belongs to the natural order _Leguminosæ_, and has only very
recently been described by Mr. Bentham, under the name of _Commilobium
polygalæflorum_: it is easily recognised at a great distance by its
numerous large panicles of lilac flowers. An essential oil, which is
contained in the fruit, is much used by the inhabitants to alleviate
the pain of the tooth-ache. A very large silk-cotton tree (_Bombax_),
entirely destitute of leaves, was also common, but on one of them I
found a few blossoms, which were of enormous size, measuring when fully
expanded about a foot and a half across; the petals were of a dark brown
colour without, but white within. Near a fazenda called Riacho d’Area,
where we stopped a day, grew a number of large palm trees, on the stems
of which I found a large fleshy-stemmed orchideous plant, a species of
_Cyrtopodium_, which produced flowering stems about four feet high,
terminating in a large panicle of flowers, with brown blotches on an
orange ground, and smelling sweetly like wall-flower.
In marshy bushy places on this journey I saw many plants of the _Vanilla
planifolia_, seldom bearing flowers, and more rarely producing fruit.
It has now been satisfactorily determined, that this is the species
from which the true Vanilla of commerce is procured. In Mexico it is
extensively cultivated for the sake of its fruit, which it yields
abundantly; while the plants which have been introduced into the East
Indies, and the hot-houses of Europe, though they have frequently
produced flowers, have very seldom perfected their fruit. Dr. Morren
of Liège was the first to study attentively the natural history of
this plant, and to prove experimentally that the fruit of the Vanilla
may be as freely produced in our hot-houses as it is in Mexico. He has
discovered that from some peculiarities in the reproductive organs of
this plant, artificial fecundation is required. In the year 1836, a
plant in one of the hot-houses in the botanic garden at Liège produced
fifty-four flowers, which having been artificially fecundated, exhibited
the same number of pods, quite equal to those imported from Mexico; and
in 1837, a fresh crop of about a hundred pods was obtained upon another
plant by the same method. He attributes the fecundation of the plant
in Mexico to the action of some insect which frequents the flower; and
hence accounts for the non-production of fruit in those plants, which
have been removed to other countries. There can be no doubt that this
plant is as perfectly indigenous to Brazil, as it is to Mexico; but it
is no less certain that its fruit is there seldom matured. Is this also
to be attributed to the absence of the means by which nature is supposed
to effect fecundation in Mexico? This is a subject which, as Professor
Morren justly observes, well deserves attention in a commercial point
of view, since his experiments go to prove, that in all intertropical
countries, vanilla might be cultivated, and a great abundance of fruit
obtained.[9]
The country in which we were travelling, is much infested by the Onça
of the inhabitants, the _Felis onca_ of Linnæus, which is also known
by the name of Jaguar. In our encampments, we used to hear them night
after night roaring at some distance, but they never came near enough
to be seen. The night we remained at Riacho d’Area, we were prevented
from sleeping during the early part of it, by the loud roaring of one of
these animals, which was so distinct and audible that it appeared to be
within a short distance; but the fazendeiro, who was more accustomed to
the sound, assured me it was at least half a league distant, and from its
noise he supposed it to be a very large male; its roar was more like the
growl of an angry dog, which generally continued for a quarter of an hour
at a time, when it terminated by a sound, two or three times repeated,
not unlike the smothered bark of a large mastiff. The dogs belonging to
the fazenda were on the alert and barking, but none of them offered to
leave the house. My horses which were feeding at a little distance, came
closer to us, when they heard the almost unearthly sounds produced by
the fierce inhabitant of the forests; even those I had brought from the
coast, and which I am certain had never been exposed to the attacks of
these animals, followed the example of the others.
The Fazenda de Saco do Tanque is situated immediately on the boundary
line between the province of Piauhy, and the south-west portion of that
of Pernambuco, which is known by the name of the district of the Rio
Preto. Shortly after entering this district, we reached an elevated
table-land called the Serra da Batalha, which it was necessary to cross;
it is about the height of the Serra de Araripe at Crato, and like it,
is covered with an ever-verdant vegetation. The ascent is a very rugged
one, consisting of large blocks of coarse white sandstone, of which the
Serra appeared to be composed. At the foot of this Serra, and on the
ascent itself, I made one of the finest collections of plants I had met
with since leaving Oeiras. In moist sandy places at its foot grow some
of those beautiful large-flowered small-leaved _Melastomaceæ_ which
are so abundant in the gold and diamond districts; while on the more
elevated sandy tracts I found immense quantities of a kind of nutmeg
(_Myristica_), which does not grow more than three feet high. The trees
on the Chapada itself consisted chiefly of the Cashew, Piki, Jatobá,
Mangába, Sicupíra, _Gomphia hexasperma_, and an arboreous _Bignonia_;
but intermingled with these, there were many beautiful trees and shrubs,
which I had not before met with.
After crossing the Chapada which is three leagues in breadth, the descent
is very gradual, and ultimately merges into a marshy plain abounding in
Buriti palms. The whole country here bore a very different aspect from
that which we had left behind us, the vegetation being fresh and verdant,
which was a great relief to the eye, after having been so long accustomed
to leafless trees, and a bare soil of red clay. The woods were all
evergreen, and between the clusters of noble Buriti palms and the wooded
parts of the country, there were large open marshy Campos covered with
grass, and other herbaceous vegetation common to marshy tracts.
We were now in a country much infested by the incursions of wild Indians,
and many of the more solitary habitations had, some time before our
arrival, been abandoned by their possessors on that account. After riding
about half a mile along the side of the first open tract we came to,
we reached one of these deserted dwellings, and a little beyond it, we
put up in another also uninhabited. At Saco do Tanque, we were informed
that these houses had been abandoned in consequence of an attack which
the Indians had made on another, a few months before, a league or two
to the westward, when all the inhabitants were put to death. As I had
many of my recent collections to put in order, and as this appeared a
favourable spot for botanizing, I remained here a day. There was also
good pasture for the horses, and they, as well as ourselves, had need of
rest. I was not disappointed in the few short rambles which I took in the
neighbourhood, as I met with several remarkable plants, quite different
from any I had before seen; among these were an _Eryngium_, a _Jussiæa_,
which formed a small tree about twenty feet high, a tree-fern, the only
one I had seen since I left Crato, and a few curious _Eriocaulons_ from
the marshes. In the deserted house in which we took up our quarters, we
were dreadfully annoyed both by musquitos and chigoes (_Bich de Pé_).
Leaving Batalha, the name of the place at which we were encamped, a
journey of three long leagues brought us to the fazenda of Santa Rosa.
We had not gone far when we had to ascend another Serra, but lower than
that of Batalha, the top of which forms a Chapada about a league broad.
Having crossed this, a very slight ascent brought us to the top of a
third elevated plane, called the Serra do Mato Grosso, from the dense
forest with which it is covered. These three Serras may more correctly
be considered as one great one, than as distinct ranges, since we found
the descent from the last about equal in height to the ascent of the
first, and both much greater than the intermediate ones; the south side
also, like the north, was covered with large blocks of sandstone. We
now entered the valley of Santa Rosa, which tends southward for about
a league and a half; in the middle of this runs a small stream of the
most limpid water I have ever seen, and on each side of it grows a strip
of tall and beautiful Buriti palms, affording food and shelter to vast
numbers of the three kinds of Maccaw already described. Near the top of
the valley there is a large lake, and another about the middle of it,
fed by the small stream, partly surrounded by the Buriti, and partly
by a much smaller palm, which very much resembles it, but its stem is
thickly covered by long sharp spines; this, which I afterwards found to
be very common in the marshy Campos of the province of Goyaz, is called
Buritizana. This beautiful valley is about a league broad at its widest
part, where the fazenda of the same name is situated, and is bounded on
the north-west side by the Serra do Livramento, about equal in height
with the Serra do Mato Grosso, which bounds it on the north-east side.
Shortly before we reached the descent of the Serra, the great variety of
new plants which I found growing there, caused me to linger far behind
the troop, but as this was very frequently the case, the men took no
notice of it. I did not often keep one of them with me, as my eye, from
long practice, had become well acquainted with the track of the troop,
from the appearance of the horses’ and the men’s foot-marks; and here,
moreover, the road had been so long free from travellers, that there
seemed no chance of any mistake occurring. In this, however, I was
deceived, for although I traced them to the lower part of the upper
lake, where the ground was very soft, and much trodden by the cattle and
horses that came there to drink; beyond this muddy tract, which was of
considerable size, I could not trace the foot-marks of my troop, although
I spent a long time in trying to do so. It is well understood among
travellers in these desert parts of Brazil, that if one of the party
should by any chance remain behind, and be unable to find the track of
his companions, he is to remain in the neighbourhood of the spot where
he first lost it, so that he may the more readily be found by those who
return to look for him. Acting upon this, and feeling certain that before
night some one of my party would be sent in search of me, I returned to
the foot of the Serra, and, under some shady trees by the road-side,
dismounted, and tying the fore-legs of my horse with the bridle, so that
he might feed, and not stray, I sat down under one of the trees to study
attentively the plants which I had collected during my morning’s ride. My
only fear was lest any of the wandering tribes of Indians, who were known
to be in the neighbouring woods, should happen to come across me, for in
consequence of the persecution they have received from the Brazilians,
they consider every white man they encounter lawful game to shoot at and
destroy. It was not till late in the afternoon that Mr. Walker, finding I
did not make my appearance, sent one of the men to look for me; and when
we returned to the place where I had been unable to follow the track, I
found they had passed over to the other side of the lake by a very narrow
path, which was completely covered over with long grass.
Finding the proprietor of the fazenda of Santa Rosa, Senhor Antonio Jozé
de Guimerãens, very civil and obliging, I determined to remain there
for some days, to make the necessary arrangements for entering upon a
journey of upwards of forty leagues through an entirely uninhabited
country. My collections made between Parnaguá and Santa Rosa, were to be
arranged and packed up, and it was with considerable difficulty that I
could find an additional horse to purchase. Our host had not one to part
with that would answer my purpose, but he kindly accompanied Mr. Walker
to a fazenda about five leagues distant, and assisted him in procuring
one. Our provision boxes also required to be replenished, and for this
purpose an ox was purchased, and its flesh prepared by drying in the
sun. No farinha was to be had at Santa Rosa, but our host went himself
to another fazenda about four leagues to the eastward, and bought me a
load. We could not, however, purchase the hide boxes which were necessary
for carrying my collections; these we were obliged to make ourselves,
under the superintendence of Mr. Walker, who was very expert in all
that related to the equipment of the troop. During the twelve days that
we found it necessary to remain at this place, I lost no opportunity
of adding to my collections, by excursions in the neighbourhood, but
particularly to the Serras which form the boundaries of the valley. One
of the finest trees I ever remember to have seen standing alone, grew by
the side of, a small brook which flowed at a little distance from the
house; it was a species of _Qualea_, with a clean straight stem about one
hundred feet in height, on which it supported a wide-spreading top of
branches; as it came into flower shortly after our arrival, and as there
was no other way of obtaining specimens than by cutting the tree down,
Senhor Guimerãens himself proposed to do so, as soon as he knew I wished
to possess a few specimens. After about two hours’ labour on the part
of himself and two of my men, this fine tree, which I was sorry to see
destroyed, came to the ground with a tremendous crash.
It was on the morning of the 21st of September that we left Santa Rosa,
and a journey of nearly three leagues brought us to the north bank of the
Rio Preto, a stream which gives origin to the name of the district, and
which takes its rise on the eastern side of the Serra do Duro, and falls
into the Rio de San Francisco, a little above Villa da Barra. Following
the course of this river downwards for about a quarter of a mile, we
arrived at the ferry which leads to the fazenda of Santa Maria, which
stands on the opposite side. At this place the river is about thirty
yards broad, is very deep and the current is very rapid; at a distance,
the water appears black as ink, and from this circumstance it takes its
name, but when close to it the water is so clear, that the bottom can be
seen at a great depth; we could also see that it was inhabited by numbers
of fine fish. Our luggage was taken over by an old Indian in a canoe,
which was so small that only one horse-load could be transported at a
time. We took up our mid-day quarters under the wide-spreading branches
of a large Cashew tree, but the shade which this kind of tree yields,
does not shelter well from the rays of the sun, as it is never very
thickly covered with leaves. We all bathed in the waters of the beautiful
stream, and rejoiced that for several days to come, we should still have
this enjoyment, as our route to the westward lay along its margin. There
is nothing so refreshing to the traveller in a tropical climate, as
frequent ablution in cold water. We were not far from the house on which
the outrage I have before mentioned was committed by the Indians; the
attack was made during the day, while the men were absent in the fields,
and after burning the house, and killing three women, they carried
off two children. The people at Santa Maria informed me they lived in
constant dread of the Indians, and that they had serious intentions of
removing to a more populous district. These Indians live generally at a
considerable distance to the north-west, only extending their excursions
into this neighbourhood when in pursuit of game, and are known by the
name of Cherentes. It is supposed this attack originated in consequence
of one of the Indians having been fired at, and wounded by mistake, who
in revenge had, with the assistance of some of his countrymen, committed
the outrage above mentioned.
The desolate tract of country, upwards of forty leagues in breadth,
which we were now about to cross, in order to reach the province of
Goyaz, is called by the people of the country Os Geräes. It is seldom
traversed except by drovers, who take cattle from the north of Goyaz to
Bahia. There is, however, a path through it, and the mulatto I engaged at
Parnaguá, having once traversed it, was to act as our guide. From him I
learned that there was only one habitation to be met with, a small hut,
occasionally occupied by an old man, half Indian, half Portuguese; but
this was of no importance to me, as I had laid in a sufficient stock of
provisions for our journey. The stories he told of the Indians, alarmed
my party very much; and I was in consequence obliged to get all my arms
put in order, so as to make as formidable an appearance as possible. I
carried a small brace of pocket pistols besides those in my holsters,
and had a large sword-knife in my belt. Mr. Walker, besides the usual
dagger-knife of the Brazilians, carried a small sword; and the men were
each armed with a gun; happily we had no occasion to make use of our
weapons. The country people have all a great dread of this wild and
uninhabited tract, and before entering it I was often asked if I was not
afraid to do so with so few attendants. Their own fear is, I believe,
greatly owing to their cowardice, a very common feeling in all parts
of the country I have visited. My mind was too much occupied with the
anticipations of the rich harvest of novelties I expected to meet with,
to think much of these dangers; the whole country I had gone over since I
had left the coast at Aracaty was virgin ground to the naturalist, with
the exception of Oeiras, which was passed through by Spix and Martius on
their journey from Bahia to Maranham.
We entered the Geräes on the afternoon of the same day we arrived at
Santa Maria, but the first part of our journey was far from auspicious.
Our route was westward along the banks of the Rio Preto, which was lined
with Buriti and Buritizana palms, and numerous flowering shrubs. After
we had gone about two leagues, the sky to the westward became very
black, and shortly afterwards distant thunder was heard. We halted by
the side of the river under some large trees, but before we could get
a shelter arranged the storm reached us. The lightning was very vivid,
the thunder loud, and the rain came pouring down in torrents; by fixing
up two large hides to the branches above us, they afforded a tolerable
shelter. As soon as the storm passed over we enlarged our house, so as
to have a place of refuge in case it should return, and it was well we
did so, for having slung our hammocks as usual between the trees, we
were aroused about midnight by a loud peal of thunder which broke right
over our heads, and as the rain fell heavily we were obliged to take
refuge in our house of hides. I thought there was something more awful
in this storm than in any I had ever experienced, but this feeling was
perhaps augmented by the solitude in which we found ourselves. It may be
asked why I did not take a tent with me? I might have done so, but in
travelling, I made it a rule to conform to the habits of the country,
and in the north of Brazil no one ever thinks of carrying a tent. Long
journeys are always avoided in the rainy season, and as the dry season
generally lasts more than seven months, that period is always selected
for this purpose. These thunder storms are invariably the precursors to
the setting in of the heavy continual rains, but we hoped before that
time to reach some town in the north of the province of Goyaz, where we
might halt till the proper season for travelling would again come round.
On the second day we made a journey of about six leagues; sometimes our
route led through dense forests by the side of the river, at other times
through open grassy meadows in which grew clusters of the Buriti palms,
and at intervals over slightly elevated flat tracts, covered with low
bushes, and abundance of a large grotesque-looking tree Lily (_Vellozia_)
on which I vainly looked for flowers, as they are only produced in the
dry season. We halted during the middle of the day, but only for a short
time, at a rude hut of palm leaves, which had been erected by some
previous traveller, by the wooded margin of a beautiful grassy meadow
about a quarter of a mile square. Late in the afternoon the sky to the
westward began to assume a lowering aspect, and shortly presented all
the appearance of an approaching thunder storm. We pushed on as quickly
as the nature of the road would allow, as our guide assured us we were
not far distant from the habitation of an old Indian. The lightning
soon commenced, and the rolling of thunder was heard in the distance;
gradually it came nearer to us, and the western sky from the horizon to
the zenith was from time to time filled with one sheet of bluish flame,
which, while it lasted, rendered the close of the twilight almost as
bright as day. Thanks to our good fortune, the storm did not then reach
us, having been diverted to the northward: passing over a high Serra
which lay in that direction, it again altered its course, and followed
fast upon our heels. It was quite dark when we arrived at the solitary
dwelling, and when I rode to the little gate in front of it, the owner
came out with a gun in his hand. He immediately granted us permission to
take shelter for the night in an open shed, and as soon as the luggage
had been arranged in it, and a few large skins had been hung up on the
weather side, the storm broke over the hut in all its fury, accompanied
by a gale of wind which quickly extinguished our lights, and we had
reason to be thankful that the whole building was not carried away before
it: uncomfortable as the place was, we rejoiced in having even such
shelter as it afforded.
The old man informed me that he lived in constant fear of an attack from
the Cherentes. He had been in this solitary place for three years, but
had now made up his mind to leave it in the course of a few months. His
wife had been dead about a year, and he and three little children were
the only inhabitants of the place. He had two houses, the best of which
was at one end of the shed in which we were stowed, but he had never
lived in it; the reason he assigned was, that the Indians when they
attack a house, immediately set fire to it, and surround it, so that no
one may escape. The hut in which he resided was at some distance from
the other, and in appearance was but little better than a pig-sty, but
he said that in case of an attack, he could very easily make his escape
from it to the woods. He had a very small piece of ground cleared by the
side of the river, in which grew some mandiocca, Indian corn, cotton,
and bananas. He possessed no cattle of his own, but I was afterwards
informed that he was very expert in stealing oxen, from the droves which
occasionally pass on their way to the coast.
Three days after we left this habitation, we arrived at a place where
the Rio Preto divides the Province of Pernambuco from that of Goyaz.
The country we passed through was very similar to the first part of the
Geräes, with the exception of the last four leagues of our journey
which lay through an undulating elevated region destitute of arboreous
vegetation; the soil was of a white sandy nature, thinly covered with
dwarf shrubs, and small dry tufts of grass: it was only here and there
that a small stunted tree made its appearance among the bushes: as we
approached the river, however, the country became more flat and better
wooded. Notwithstanding the arid nature of this tract, its scanty
vegetation was, with few exceptions, quite new to me. The moister sandy
places afforded me several of those curious _Eriocaulons_, of which so
many exist in my collections, one of these, which I found shortly before
we reached the river, was a large branched species about five feet in
height; these remarkable forms I afterwards met with in great abundance
in the Diamond District, which is the great centre of the _Eriocaulons_,
as it is of the _Vellozias_, or tree-lily tribe. The river we here found
to be about forty feet broad, and not less than from sixteen to twenty
feet in depth; the current was still rapid, and the water so limpid,
that the bottom could be seen quite distinctly. Several large Buriti
palms grow on its banks, and the bridge by which we crossed, was one of
these trees cut down, so as to fall across the stream. It was not without
considerable trouble, that we got all our luggage taken to the other
side, which when accomplished, the horses were swum over a little further
up the river. At about two hundred yards from its banks we encamped under
a large Myrtle tree (_Myrica_), where we remained a day, for I found it
to be an excellent place for my researches. In a marsh by the side of
the river, I collected specimens of an _Isoetes_, which does not appear
to differ from the one (_Isoetes lacustris_, Linn.) which grows in Great
Britain. The sight of this plant recalled pleasing recollections of long
past times, and I could not refrain from indulging in a lengthened train
of reflections, which ended by comparing it with myself—a stranger in a
strange land, and associated with still stranger companions.
Our next journey, which was one of four long leagues, through an arid,
undulating, sandy, thinly-wooded country, brought us to the foot of
the Chapada da Mangabeira, an elevated level table-land, nearly forty
miles broad. On this journey we were dreadfully scorched by a burning
sun; not a breath of wind was to be felt, and we all suffered very much
from thirst, as not a drop of water was to be met with, and the men had
neglected to fill the large leathern bag (boracho) before we started.
Shortly after leaving Oeiras, I was obliged to provide myself with
one of these necessary articles; it held about two gallons, and when
full, was carried between the two side loads of one of the horses. We
encamped beneath a large Piki tree, not far from a spring of cool clear
water which emptied itself into a large morass. As this is the last
watering-place to be met with till the Chapada is crossed, the usual way
of proceeding is to leave it about mid-day, and push on without stopping
till half of the distance has been performed; and by leaving again early
on the following morning, the next watering-place may be gained in the
forenoon.
On the day succeeding that on which we arrived at the foot of the
Chapada, we started to cross it about one o’clock in the afternoon. The
horses were previously allowed to drink freely, and I took care that the
leathern bag was not neglected this time. After travelling about half
a league, we entered by a gradual ascent upon the Chapada, and at the
same time were overtaken by a thunder storm, which, however, passed over
without wetting us much. After a journey of five leagues, we arrived at
a place where there are a few small trees, and under them we halted for
the night. Tor the first league and a half, the Chapada was thinly-wooded
with small trees, which became gradually smaller and thinner, till at
last not one was to be seen; only a few stunted shrubs, from a foot to
a foot and a half high, exist on this barren spot; and the only living
thing we saw, was a kind of locust, about two inches long, which rose in
clouds before the horses. Many skeletons of horses and oxen lay on both
sides of the path no doubt the remains of animals which on crossing this
desert tract, had become exhausted, and died from want of water. After
the thunder storm passed over, the sky became clear and unclouded and the
sunset was one of the most beautiful I have ever seen, its splendour, and
the ocean-like plain over which we were travelling, reminded me of those
I have so often seen at sea, between the tropics. The atmosphere, too,
was delightfully cool, and heavily laden with the rich perfume of one of
the small shrubs then in flower, which grew in the greatest profusion;
this shrub, which I afterwards found to be the _Spiranthera odoratissima_
of St. Hilaire, grows in small clusters, and bears large corymbs of
pure white flowers larger than those of the honeysuckle, but not unlike
them in shape, although their odour more resembles that of the Jasmine.
Shortly after we reached our resting-place, the sky again became clouded
towards the west, and there was much lightning, which made us fear
another storm. As usual, we slung our hammocks between the trees, and,
contrary to our expectations, passed the night without rain.
We resumed our journey again as early as possible after daybreak, and
having accomplished five leagues more, the greater part of which was
along one of the worst roads we had yet encountered, we halted under some
large trees close to a marsh, on the south-west side of the Chapada.
At about half a league from where we slept, the descent of the Chapada
begins, and from thence a fine view of a large plain below is obtained,
which is almost entirely surrounded by a chain of low hills, several of
which to the south are of a conical form; the descent is very rocky,
and on both sides of the road stand a great many isolated columnar and
wall-like portions, which give the traveller the idea that he is passing
through the ruins of a large city, destroyed by some great catastrophe.
The rock is a conglomerate, and as many of the rounded stones of which
it is composed are of considerable size, this resemblance becomes the
more striking. This side of the Chapada is entirely composed of a coarse
sandstone, which in some places is much softer than in others, and the
ruin-like portions have, no doubt, been formed by the disintegration of
those of a softer texture. On the descent, we had often to dismount and
lead our horses; one of the pack-horses fell, and rolled over several
times before he could regain a footing. As soon as we reached the marsh,
the horses rushed into the water to quench their thirst, before they
could be unloaded, and although it was still early in the day when we
arrived, I determined to remain here till the following morning, so that
they might rest. The evening was again cloudy, with thunder and lightning
in the distance, which induced us to construct our huts of skins, that we
might be sheltered in case of rain; but none, however, fell.
Early on the following morning, we started with the intention of going
direct to Duro, an Indian mission about four leagues distant, but when
we were within about a league of it, we entered upon a wrong road, and
had gone nearly two leagues, before the man who acted as our guide,
discovered his mistake; it being then about the middle of the day, we
halted to take breakfast under the shade of a large _Vochysia_, which
overhung a spring of limpid water; but we had no sooner taken possession
of this spot, than our right to it was called in question by some
thousands of a small bee, not so large as a common house-fly; they came
buzzing about in all directions, from the hollow stem of the large tree
in which they had their habitation; they had no sting, but they annoyed
us very much, by flying about the face, and getting entangled in the
hair. After kindling a large fire, they soon became less troublesome;
the only one of our party who seemed to be much alarmed at them, was my
little monkey, who when they came swarming about his head, covered it
with his hands, and screaming fearfully, leaped upon me, and hid himself
under my jacket.
The country over which we passed before reaching this place, is of an
undulating character, consisting generally of large open campos, the soil
of which is principally a white sand, and being but scantily covered
with herbaceous vegetation, the glare caused by the bright sun-shine was
very fatiguing to the eyes. On these campos, as well as on the Chapada
da Mangabeira, a dwarf cashew is very abundant, growing gregariously,
and not more than a foot high; I found it both in flower and in fruit,
but the latter is not much larger than a gooseberry. It seems to be
distinct from the arboreous species, and is called by the Brazilians
Cajú rasteiro. Although the hilly parts of the country are dry, and have
an arid look, the little hollows or valleys which intersect them, have
always a small stream of clear and cool water flowing through them, and
are generally well wooded. About half a mile from the Aldea of Duro, we
overtook an Indian who was returning from the woods, and who conducted
us to the house of one of their two captains, of whom we made enquiries
about a house to put up in, but he knew of none. After some time, we
were permitted to occupy one not yet finished, being open all round, but
well roofed; by means of some hides, we, however, contrived to render it
somewhat comfortable. As I found it necessary to remain here for several
days, I was well pleased to have the use of this habitation, as it was
not safe to trust ourselves in the open air, now that the rains were
setting in.
The mission of Duro is situated on the Serra of the same name, upon a low
flat hill, round the western base of which, flows a small stream, called
the Riacho de Sucuriú, which at all seasons, supplies the inhabitants
with abundance of excellent water. The Aldea itself contains about twenty
houses, all of which are of the most miserable description; the greater
part of them are entirely made of a frame-work of poles covered over with
palm-leaves, and many of them are so much decayed from the united effects
of time and weather, that they no longer form a barrier against wind or
rain; others, which are built of wicker-work and clay, are scarcely in a
better condition. They are so arranged as to form an irregular square,
but two of the sides still remain nearly open; on the west side, there
is a small church almost in ruins, with a beautiful large Genipapo tree
in front. The mission contains in all twelve square leagues of country,
being the grant made to it at its original formation by the Jesuits,
and over this space, there are scattered twenty or thirty other houses.
The entire population, at the time of my visit, amounted to about 250
souls; although the greater part of them are of pure Indian breed, some
of them have mixed with the blacks, who from time to time, have taken
up their residence among them, many of these have been runaway slaves.
It is very easy, however, to recognise the pure Indian, by his reddish
colour, long straight hair, high cheek bones, and the peculiar obliquity
of his eyes. Notwithstanding that the present race has been brought up
in a comparative state of civilization, they still retain many of the
characteristics of the savage state. A few of the more respectable of
them dress in the same manner as the Brazilians of the Sertão, viz., in
a short pair of cotton drawers, with a shirt of the same stuff hanging
loose over them; others make use of the drawers only, which are generally
far from being clean, and are made of a very coarse kind of stuff wrought
by the women. The dress of the latter is also very simple; a few wear a
chemise, and petticoat made of printed calico, but by far the greater
number have only a petticoat of the same coarse material that the men
wear, tied round their middle, all above which is bare. The girls run
about quite naked till they are nine or ten years of age, and the boys
till they are from twelve to fourteen. Some of the young girls have very
pleasing countenances, which, however, they do not long retain, judging
from the looks of the older women.
Although both the soil and climate of the mission are well adapted
for the cultivation of the various productions of the tropics, the
inhabitants are so indolent, that they are generally in a state of
starvation; I could procure neither farinha de mandiocca, rice, yams,
sweet potatoes, plantains, nor bananas, and when we arrived, our stock
of beef being quite exhausted, it was with the greatest difficulty I
succeeded in purchasing a cow. All the cattle which exist in the mission
amount only to about forty, and these belong to two individuals. They
possess altogether only seventeen horses. The principal part of the food
of these people is of a vegetable nature, consisting of wild fruits which
they obtain from the woods, such as the nuts of different kinds of palms,
the fruit of the Pika, Pusá, Mangába, Jatobá, Pitomba, Guava, Araçá,
&c. At the season we were among them, the principal fruit they made use
of, was a kind of palm nut, about an inch and a half long, which they
called Shódó. They first cut the fleshy substance, which corresponds
with the fibrous portion of the cocoa-nut, and a large stone which is
generally placed at the door, is used for breaking the nut upon, in
order to procure the substance within. Numbers of these Indians used to
start early in the morning, being roused by a kind of drum, and go to
the woods to the westward to collect these nuts, and during the day
nothing was to be heard in the Aldea, but the breaking of them between
the two stones. The little animal food they do eat, is procured by
hunting, and this is an occupation which the young men are much fonder
of, than working in a plantation. A few days after we arrived, thirteen
or fourteen of them set off on a hunting excursion to the other side
of the Chapada da Mangabeira, and after an absence of eight days, they
returned well loaded with the flesh of deer, and of the large kind of
Peccary (Queixado), in a half-roasted state, this being the plan they
make use of, for preserving it for a few days, having no salt for curing
it. On their return to the Aldea, this spoil was divided among their
friends; it was all immediately devoured without salt or any kind of
vegetable, except a few small capsicums. On the following day, scarcely
an Indian was to be seen stirring abroad; like the boa constrictor, they
were sleeping away the effects of their over-dose of food. When our cow
was killed, I was fearful we should not be allowed to keep any of it
to ourselves; for one came begging the head, another the feet, a third
the liver, and so on, with all the internal parts; and when these were
exhausted, they even began to ask for pieces of the beef itself.
Till within the last ten years, they had a resident priest among them,
but since that period, they have been without any; once a year, they
have a few days’ visit from one residing in the Villa de Natividade,
thirty leagues distant, where their marriages are celebrated, and their
children baptized. There is no school in the Aldea, and the only persons
who can read and write are the two captains, one of whom is a man about
forty years of age; the other, who is called Luiz Francisco Pinto, was
then in his seventy-fourth year, and from him I obtained nearly all my
information regarding the mission. His wife, who was nearly as old as
himself, was confined to bed from dropsy; I visited her frequently during
our stay, prescribing such medicines as I thought would be of service to
her; but what she most enjoyed, was a small basin of tea which I sent
her morning and evening. Part of the wall of the apartment in which she
was lying had fallen in, but an attempt had been made to keep out the
wind and rain, by placing a few palm leaves in the aperture. All the
inhabitants speak Portuguese, but many of them still keep up the language
of their forefathers.
By the old captain I was informed that the mission was established in
the year 1730, by a Lieut. Colonel Wencisläo Gomez, who came up with
troops from Pernambuco, and conquered the Coroá nation of Indians, being
that from which the present race is descended; at that time they formed
three Aldeas, and amounted in all to about 1,000 individuals. These three
Aldeas were united to form the present one, Duro, which place is called
in their own language Ropechedy, signifying beautiful situation, a title
which it well merits. Here also I found that the inhabitants lived in
constant fear of the Cherente Indians, who inhabit the woods on the banks
of the Rio Tocantins to the north-west of Duro. These Indians have made
several attacks on the mission, but the occasion on which they committed
the greatest havock, was in the year 1789, when a body of them amounting
to upwards of two hundred, surrounded the Aldea one morning about ten
o’clock, and before evening had burned all the houses in the outskirts
of the Aldea, and killed about forty persons, including men, women, and
children. They also carried away four children, two of whom were nephews
of the old captain. The inhabitants of the Aldea kept up a constant fire
upon the Cherentes, but they could not tell how many of them were killed,
as they took all their dead with them when they left.
On several nights, during our stay at the Mission, fires were seen on
the Serras at no great distance, and one day, as one of the inhabitants
was returning from the woods, he saw an Indian, armed with his bow
and arrows, cross the path before him. These circumstances caused the
inhabitants to dread another attack, and they were but poorly prepared to
meet it. Formerly they used to have a supply of arms and ammunition sent
to them every year by the government, but for many years past, these had
not been furnished to them, and the old ones were nearly worn out. In
cases of necessity, the government can call upon the captains to take
the field with their men, and each can raise about forty, able to carry
arms. A few of these Indians have guns of their own, which they use in
hunting, and their powder is a coarse kind, manufactured by themselves.
Some of the shopkeepers in the towns to the south-west, every year go
down by the Rio Tocantins to Pará to sell hides and purchase European
goods; very frequently some of the young men belonging to Duro hire
themselves to work the canoes, and with the money which they receive for
their services, purchase at Pará axes and other iron tools; a party of
them returned from one of these trips during our visit.
During the fortnight we remained in the Aldea do Duro, I was principally
occupied in drying the immense collection of specimens obtained in
the latter part of the journey across the Geräes and the Chapada da
Mangabeira, and in packing up all those which had been procured between
Santa Rosa and Duro. I also made many excursions in the neighbourhood of
the Aldea, and notwithstanding it was then the end of the dry season, I
found it an excellent field for my researches. The sandy marshes yielded
me many curious _Eriocaulons_, and beautiful _Melastomaceæ_; while the
upland campos produced several species of _Diplusodon_, many _Compositæ_,
_Labiatæ_, &c.; but the most common, as well as the most beautiful
of the productions of the campos, were a small _Bignonia_ growing in
tufts, and scarcely a foot high, bearing numerous large lemon-coloured
trumpet-shaped flowers, an _Ipomæa_, similar in habit and about the same
size, producing large violet-coloured blossoms (_Ipomæa hirsutissima_,
Gardn.) and two erect kinds of _Echites_:[10] in dry rocky places
_Amaryllis Solandræflora_, Lindl., was very common, producing abundantly
its large yellow flowers.
We left Duro on the thirteenth of October, and slept at the house of
one of the Indians, about two leagues distant from the Aldea: the owner
of it, hearing on what day I was to leave, arrived the night before,
and begged of me to call at his house, which was but a little way off
the road, to see his wife who had been blind for some years, and was
then suffering from ophthalmia. I, of course, could not refuse his
request, and the poor fellow tried to make us as comfortable as his
miserable residence would allow. This place was called Cachoeira, from a
small waterfall near it; the high undulating hills which surrounded the
valley in which the house stood, gave it a very picturesque appearance.
There were two other houses at a short distance from that in which we
slept, and although they are surrounded by the finest possible grounds
for plantations, the three families have but one small spot planted
with mandiocca, which seemed to be the only article they cultivate.
Although there were abundant pastures in the neighbourhood, not one of
them possessed a single cow, and their excuse for not having one, was
the trouble it would give them to make a fence round their plantation;
rather than do any manual labour of that kind, they prefer lounging
about the house in a state of idleness, or going out in the woods with
their gun and axe, in search of game and wild honey. Our farinha being
nearly exhausted, I enquired whether any was to be had at this place,
but they had none, nor would they have a supply for a month to come, as
the mandiocca was not yet ripe; fortunately a young man passed in the
evening with a very small quantity which he at first refused to sell, as
he was taking it to a neighbour in return for some he had borrowed; he
consented, however, to let me have half of it, on condition of receiving
dried beef in exchange, which, as we had then plenty, I agreed to.
On the journey from Duro to this place, we traversed a beautiful country
of hill and dale, much of it being thinly wooded; some of the more open
upland fields, owing to the recent rains, were covered with new grass
about a foot high, on which no animals fed, excepting a few wild deer. It
is a general custom among the cattle farmers, to burn the pastures at the
end of the dry season, in order that the new grass may spring up rapidly
on the setting in of the rains; this is also done by the inhabitants of
the mission, but with the view to keep their hunting grounds more open,
and encourage the visits of deer. It seems probable, that at no very
distant period the whole of this district, and much of the country that
lies to the east and north-west, will be converted into large cattle
farms, as it is well calculated for the rearing of cattle, owing to the
mildness of the climate, and the abundance of grass and water which
exists here all the year round.
The rain prevented our leaving Cachoeira on the following day till two
o’clock in the afternoon, when after a journey of two leagues, we arrived
at the house of the Juiz de Paz of Duro; on account of the bad state of
the roads it was dusk before we accomplished this distance. The first
league and a half of our journey was over a hilly rocky country, when we
began to descend the Serra do Duro, and shortly afterwards entered upon
a flat rather thickly-wooded tract. It is at the foot of the Serra that
the mission of Duro terminates, and about half a mile from it stands
the house in which the Juiz de Paz resided; it was exceedingly small,
and as the outer room, that generally given to travellers, would not
conveniently hold us, he told me we should find much better accommodation
at the house of a relation of his, who lived about a gunshot distant, and
he kindly accompanied us thither. On reaching it, we found half a dozen
Indians, sitting round a fire under a verandah in front of the house, and
superintending the cooking of their supper in a large pot. While we were
arranging our trunks against the wall, the master of the house begged
of us to wait till the men had taken out their beds, when each came and
carried his away, which however consisted of nothing more than half a
cow’s hide; they sleep here as in the Aldea, stretching the hide in a
corner, on which they lie without taking off their clothes; I saw no one
make use of a hammock.
A journey of three leagues from the residence of the Juiz de Paz, through
a flat thinly-wooded country, almost destitute of herbaceous vegetation,
(no rains having as yet fallen in this quarter,) brought us to a fazenda,
situated on the banks of the Rio de Manoel Alvez, a large stream which
takes its rise in the Serra do Duro, to the north of the Aldea, and falls
into the Rio Tocantins. At this fazenda we were informed, that as the
river had risen considerably, it would be impossible for our horses to
cross with their loads; and the canoe used for ferrying over passengers
and luggage, had been carried away by the floods of the previous season,
circumstances which rendered it necessary to have everything transported
across the river on men’s heads. At the fazenda I engaged a negro and
a mulatto, to assist my own men in this operation; the ferry was about
a mile further down; here the river is about forty yards broad and the
current very strong, in consequence of a rapid which exists a little
further below. When the two men, who both were tall and strong, entered
with the first loads, it was with difficulty they could keep their feet,
as the water, during the greater part of the way, took them up to the
shoulders; the recompense they asked, half a dollar each, was, however,
very dearly earned, as they had each to cross the river backwards and
forwards about twelve times, which occupied more than two hours. Mr.
Walker and I attempted to cross a little above the ferry by swimming,
but the force of the current swept us both over the rapids; Mr. Walker
being carried with great force against some rocks, and it was with no
small difficulty, that he reached the opposite side below the rapid in a
state of great exhaustion. I was more fortunate, being carried down at a
place clear of rocks, where I soon regained the same bank of the river I
had just left. I returned to the ferry, where I succeeded in crossing,
being assisted by one of the men, for I was too low in stature to be
able to bear up against the current alone. After this delay we resumed
our journey, with the intention of halting during the night at a fazenda
about a league further, but finding we had still ample time, we pushed
on to a village called Almas, about two leagues to the westward, which
we reached about sunset. The country we passed after crossing the river
was nearly flat and thinly wooded, but not so much scorched up as that we
traversed in the morning.
The village of Almas is situated in a hollow, and consists of a few
irregular streets, the houses of which are low and of mean appearance,
being built of large unburned bricks, made of clay mixed with chopped
grass and dried in the sun. The number of its inhabitants amounts to
about 800, by far the greater part of whom are blacks and mulattos, and
intermixtures between these and Indians. The Juiz de Paz was a creole
negro, who could neither read nor write; he was the principal shopkeeper
in the village, and annually made a journey to Bahia to purchase goods.
The village contains a church, which is in about as ruined a condition as
that of Duro, and, in like manner, has no resident priest. Although the
neighbourhood presents abundance of excellent ground for plantations, not
one was here to be seen. Upon our arrival I fully expected to be able to
purchase some farinha, but none was to be had; it was indeed only as a
great favour that a person who came to consult me professionally, sold me
a little rice. Every one was complaining of the scarcity of provisions,
and the want of money, but not a word was said about the indolence and
idleness, which no doubt was the cause of the famine that now existed
among them. In consequence of almost incessant rains, we were obliged to
remain in the village four days.
Our first stage from Almas was to a fazenda, called Galheiro Morto, said
to be only two leagues farther, but I have no doubt its real distance
was nearly four, judging from the time we took to perform the journey.
The leagues in this part of the country have never been measured, and
as the land was originally bought by the league, it was the interest
of the purchaser to take as large a portion as he could obtain; in the
province of Piauhy, we found the leagues much longer than those of Ceará
but those of Goyaz even exceeded them. This difference is so manifest,
that they are designated as the short one (legoa pequena), and the long
one (legoa grande); the shorter league I always found to be quite long
enough, and whenever the long one was to be travelled over, I usually
calculated the time necessary for accomplishing two short ones, and,
indeed, I seldom found it required less. We halted at this place till the
afternoon, when another journey of three leagues brought us to a little
hamlet, consisting of about half a dozen houses, called Morhinos. The
owner of the house where we put up for the night, returned from the woods
shortly after our arrival, with a considerable quantity of wild honey,
some of which he kindly gave us, and we found it to be excellent; it was
the product of one of the smaller bees which are so numerous in this
part of Brazil. This was the season in which the people go to the woods
in search of honey; it is so generally used, that after leaving Duro, a
portion was presented to us at almost every house where we stopped. These
bees mostly belong to the genus _Melipona_, Illig., and I collected a
great many, which with some other zoological specimens were afterwards
lost in crossing a river. A list of them with their native names and a
few observations may not be uninteresting.
1. _Jatahy._—This is a very minute yellowish-coloured species,
being scarcely two lines long. The honey, which is excellent,
very much resembles that of the common hive-bee of Europe.
2. _Mulher branco._—About the same size as the _Jatahy_, but of
a whitish colour; the honey is likewise good, but a little acid.
3. _Tubí._—A little black bee, smaller than a common house-fly;
the honey is good, but has a peculiar and bitter flavour.
4. _Manoel d’abreu._—About the size of the _Tubí_, but of a
yellowish colour; its honey is good.
5. _Atakira._—Black, and nearly of the same size as the _Tubí_,
the principal distinction between them consisting in the kind
of entrance to their hives; the _Tubí_ makes it of wax, the
_Atakira_ of clay; its honey is very good.
6. _Oarití._—Of a blackish colour, and about the same size as
the _Tubí_; its honey is rather sour, and not good.
7. _Tataíra._—About the size of the _Tubí_, but with a yellow
body, and a black head; its honey is excellent.
8. _Mumbúco._—Black, and larger than the _Tubí_; the honey
after being kept about an hour becomes as sour as lemon juice.
9. _Bejuí._—Very like the _Tubí_, but smaller; its honey is
excellent.
10. _Tiubá._—Of the size of a large house-fly, and of a greyish
black colour; its honey is excellent.
11. _Borá._—About the size of a house-fly, and of a yellowish
colour; its honey is acid.
12. _Urussú._—About the size of a large bumble bee; the head is
black and the body yellowish; it produces good honey.
13. _Urussú preto._—Entirely black, and upwards of one inch in
length; it likewise produces good honey.
14. _Caniára._—Black, and about the same size as the _Urussú
preto_; its honey is too bitter to be eatable; it is said to be
a great thief of the honey of other bees.
15. _Chupê._—About the size of the _Tiubá_, and of a black
colour; it makes its hive of clay on the branches of trees, and
is often of a very large size; its honey is good.
16. _Urapuá._—Very like the _Chupê_, but it always builds its
hive rounder, flatter, and smaller.
17. _Enchí._—This is a kind of wasp, about the size of a
house-fly; its head is black, and the body yellow; it builds
its hive in the branches of trees; this is of a papery tissue,
about three feet in circumference; its honey is good.
18. _Enchú pequeno._—Very similar to the last, but it always
makes a smaller hive; it also produces good honey.
The first eleven of these honey-bees construct their cells in the hollow
trunks of trees, and the others, either in similar situations or beneath
the ground; it is only the last three kinds that sting, all the others
being harmless. The only attempt I ever saw to domesticate any of these
bees, was by a Cornish miner, in the Gold District, who cut off those
portions of the trunks of the trees which contained the nests, and hung
them up under the eaves of his house; they seemed to thrive very well,
but whenever the honey was wanted, it was necessary to destroy the bees.
Both the Indians and the other inhabitants of the country, are very
expert in tracing these insects to the trees in which they hive: they
generally mix the honey, which is very fluid, with farinha before they
eat it, and of the wax they make a coarse kind of taper about a yard
long, which serves in lieu of candles, and which the country people bring
to the villages for sale. We found these very convenient, and always
carried a sufficient stock with us; not unfrequently we were obliged to
manufacture them ourselves, from the wax obtained by my own men; a coarse
soft kind of cotton yam for wicks was always to be purchased at the
different fazendas and villages through which we passed.
From Morhinos we went on to the fazenda of Nossa Senhora d’Amparo, the
distance being about three leagues. It was my intention to proceed two
leagues farther, to a fazenda called Santa Cruz, on the banks of the Rio
do Peixe, there being a canoe there for crossing it; but having enquired
about the state of the river, we were informed that it was then low, and
might be forded at a place farther up, without taking off the loads,
and, moreover, save a circuit of nearly two leagues. We had yet about
a league to go before we reached this ferry, where I found the river
much smaller than that of Manoel Alvez, and shallow enough to be passed
without difficulty; but, notwithstanding this, one of the loads of dried
plants met with a sad misfortune, the horse that bore it slipped, and
fell down, just as he was emerging from the bank, when one of the boxes
dropped into the river, and before it could be extracted was filled
with water; it is only a botanist who can imagine my feelings on this
occasion, when I saw upwards of 2,000 specimens, that had cost me so
much labour to procure, completely drenched, and apparently ruined for
ever. My first care was to unpack them, and put them into dry paper, but
so many specimens were laid on every sheet, that this process had but
little effect in dissipating the moisture; I contented myself, however,
with the hope of being able next day to unpack them, and spread them out
in the sun. After the box was dried, and the plants again deposited in
it, the package was, for greater security, placed upon a stronger horse;
we had not, however, proceeded above half a league, when in crossing a
small rivulet, I had again the mortification to see the same box, as
well as another that had previously escaped this disaster, both plunged
below the water. The unlucky animal that carried them was leading the
way, when instead of entering at the right fording-place, he stumbled
into a deep hole, with a muddy bottom, and in struggling to extricate
himself, flung off both the packages. If I felt much chagrined on the
former occasion, it may be imagined what my distress was, when I saw the
hard labour of many weeks, the produce of a district hitherto unexplored
by any botanist, thus apparently consigned to ruin; all that then could
be done, was to drain the water out of the boxes, and resume our journey.
It happened most fortunately that towards evening we reached a fazenda,
where the principal article manufactured was farinha de mandiocca; and as
it rained heavily all the next day, I was glad to obtain permission to
make use of two large stoves, on which we dried, sheet by sheet, all the
specimens that had been soaked; it was, however, the most fatiguing day’s
work I ever encountered, for both Mr. Walker and myself were incessantly
occupied over the heated stoves, from six o’clock in the morning till
after midnight. In consequence of this prompt attention, the plants did
not suffer so much as I anticipated.
We remained two days at this fazenda, called Mato Virgem, having to wait
one day longer that I intended, owing to our want of farinha; the day
after our arrival they commenced the manufacture of a quantity, which
could not be got ready until the evening before we left. The place in
which it was prepared, was the apartment where we were allowed to put
up, the persons engaged in it being the mistress of the house, who
was a young mulatta, and eight slaves, four men and four women; I was
astonished to find all of them, except one man and one woman, affected
with goître; the swelling on the neck of one of the women was much larger
than her head. They assured me it was a very general complaint in this
part of the province of Goyaz, particularly in the Villas of Natividade
and Arrayas; in the Aldea of Duro, I saw only one woman affected by
it, and another in the Arraial of Almas. One of the slaves was an old
man upwards of one hundred years of age, and quite blind, but he was,
notwithstanding, occupied all day in sifting farinha; his only dress
consisted of a small dirty rag rolled round his middle; that of the
others was but little better, indeed, in no part of Brazil did I meet
with slaves so wretchedly attired as at this place. It was surprising to
me that the mistress was not ashamed to see them in such a state; but I
have no doubt, the fault was with the owner of the fazenda, who, judging
from his appearance, seemed to be an old miser.
When we left Mato Virgem it was our intention to reach a little hamlet,
called João Lopez, said to be three long leagues distant. We were told
that we should have no difficulty in getting there, as there was a
straight road to it; but we had scarcely travelled a league and a half
when we came to a place where there were two equally beaten paths, and
not knowing which to take, we chose that leading to the right, and
continuing onwards all day, through a flat thinly-wooded country, without
seeing either man or house, we arrived at a fazenda, a little before sun
down, where we were told, what I already suspected, that we had taken
the wrong road; but it was of little consequence, as it led also to
the Villa de Natividade, the place we finally intended to reach. This
fazenda, called Sociedade, belongs to Senhor Manoel José Alves Leite, a
young Portuguese, who was then Juiz de Paz of the Arraial da Chapada,
a village about a league distant. On our arrival, we were very kindly
treated by him; a fowl was immediately killed, and an excellent supper
prepared, to which we did ample justice, after our long day’s journey.
The Portuguese who settle in the country, are said by the Brazilians to
be of a mean and grasping disposition, and deficient in the sentiment of
benevolence; this may be the case with many among the great number of
the uneducated, who emigrate from Portugal to Brazil, where there is not
much inducement to the improvement of their character, but among them
there are many young men, who have received some education, and who by
their good behaviour, and closer attention to business than the proud and
indolent Brazilians, sooner acquire means of independence, which causes
them to become the objects both of their envy and dislike. I had little
opportunity of associating with the Portuguese on the coast, but in the
interior, I have met with many worthy men of that nation, who have shown
me the greatest kindness, when this has been refused by a Brazilian.
Ever since the independence of Brazil, they have been very greatly
persecuted, and whenever any political disturbance takes place, as a
necessary consequence, numbers of Portuguese are murdered, and robbed of
all they possess: there exists no fellow-feeling between the two nations.
As soon as our host became aware of my intention to remain a month or two
at Natividade, in order to give rest to my horses, he most kindly urged
me to send them to his fazenda, where he would take charge of them till
our departure; such, indeed, was the civility we experienced, that I had
no reason to regret having taken the wrong road.
Early on the following morning, the 25th of October, we left Sociedade,
and after a journey of two long leagues, reached the Villa de Natividade.
The country between these two places is flat and thinly-wooded, but on
the east side of the road, near the Villa, there is an extensive Serra,
about 2,000 feet high, which stretches from north to south. The road
passes near the base of this Serra for about half a league, and I was
astonished to see the soil, which is of a gravelly nature, dug up into
deep trenches, and at intervals the ruins of what appeared once to have
been houses. These trenches, I was informed, were old gold workings,
which had been abandoned for a long time, on account of the gold being
exhausted. The gold-workings seem to have been carried to a considerable
extent, for the entire soil, for about half a league in length, and more
than a quarter of a mile in breadth, had evidently been completely turned
over, to some depth, and the whole appeared to have undergone the process
of washing; I afterwards found that most of the country in the vicinity
of the Villa had been explored in the same manner. On our arrival, we
had no difficulty in finding an empty house for our accommodation, and
shortly afterwards; the rains set in very heavily, on which account we
were detained here upwards of three months. This, however, I did not
regret, after our long journey of considerably more than a thousand
miles, reckoned from the time we left Oeiras, from the effects of which
the horses had become much exhausted.
I must not omit to mention, that on our journey from Duro to Natividade,
we met with great abundance of a delicious wild fruit, a kind of Mangába
(_Hancornia pubescens var. Gardneri_, Alph. DC.) different from the one
that grows so abundantly in the province of Ceará and Pernambuco; the
fruit is nearly twice its size, and even more delicious. We first met
with it on the Serra do Duro, where it is called Mangába do morro, but it
is also abundant on the Chapadas, on the plain below, and like that of
the other species, this is only good to eat when ripe enough to fall from
the tree.