SCENES AT THE PASS OF APURITO.
When we were apprised that every thing was ready at the pass, we moved
on from San Pablo with the horses, the cattle following behind by easy
marches, to allow them sufficient time to graze on the rich herbage by
the way.
On our arrival at Apurito, we found the river quite swollen with the
recent showers and already extending from bank to bank. The first
business was to select among our men and horses the strongest and most
capable of enduring the fatigue and of guiding through the boisterous
waves of the Apure the various lots into which the cattle were divided
for the purpose. Our next step was to assemble at the pass a sufficient
number of canoes with expert paddlers to act in concert with the leading
men and horses, by flanking the swimmers in the river. Two long
palisades, running parallel down to the bank of the river and narrowing
toward the water, had already been constructed; through these the
animals, in lots of two hundred at a time, were driven at full speed,
with deafening shouts and earnest goading, while two men, stripped naked
and mounted on two spirited horses without saddles, headed the movement,
plunging headlong into the river pell-mell with the cattle, which were
thus encouraged to swim across. A herd of tame animals was stationed on
the opposite shore to incorporate the swimmers as they came out of the
water. Having done this, the leaders swam back to procure another lot of
animals, a feat they performed for about twenty successive times in the
course of the day. Nevertheless, the task was not so easily accomplished
as was practised with the horses; for it often happened that the bulls
became quite refractory and pugnacious, in which case the men in the
canoes were obliged to hold them by the horns, dragging them along by
main force as they paddled on; at other times the beasts got alongside
of the leading men and horses, and then the danger to both was imminent,
the bulls attacking them in the water; thus many valuable horses were
killed by these infuriated animals, while the men had several narrow
escapes. What with savage bulls, electric eels, crocodiles and
caribes--not to mention other pernicious creatures of the waters and the
broad expanse of the river before them--the task of these bold
adventurers is truly appalling; yet they go to work and accomplish their
task with a willing heart and a perfect _nonchalance_ of every thing
around them. The same might be said also in regard to the noble steeds
which share with them the dangers of the river, acting at the same time
the part of floating bridges to the men, and as decoys to the cattle
during the passage. Their powers of endurance, in this instance, are
the more surprising, inasmuch as they are not allowed even a few
moments’ rest after they land, being kept in constant motion the whole
day.
A number of horsemen with lazos were also stationed along the shore to
secure those bulls which, eluding the vigilance of the men in the
canoes, succeeded in regaining the land; many were drowned, however, in
the attempt, and their carcasses abandoned to the turkey-buzzards, from
an inherent disgust among the people of the Llanos for the flesh of
animals which have not been killed in the usual way. On one or two
occasions, the whole troop rebelled against their drivers and succeeded
in making their escape to their pasture fields, in spite of the horsemen
on shore; others, after reaching the sloping banks across the river
below the pass, were arrested in their flight by the overhanging cliffs,
and finally hurled to a watery grave by the rapid rise of the river.
Thus the cost of these expeditions, although exceedingly interesting to
those participating in the excitement, is sometimes greater than the
profits arising therefrom, and none but Llaneros, who are accustomed to
live on beef and water, ought to indulge in this truly savage business.
Our loss in horses alone, without reckoning the expenses of the
expedition and the danger to flesh and bone, amounted on this occasion
to about thirty animals, which in round figures, setting the value of
every horse at the minimum price of one hundred dollars, would make the
sum of three thousand dollars; while the value of the cattle itself,
many of which were also lost to us, could hardly be set down at five
dollars a head at that epoch. One of the horses was so valuable, that
our Leader requested the Doctor to attend the wounded animal and
endeavor to save his life if possible. On examination, it was found that
his bowels were partly forced out through the wound; but as he would not
allow any body to touch him, it was resolved to tie his feet; then
passing a pole through the legs of the animal, he was lifted from the
ground in a reverse position, to allow the Doctor to operate more
conveniently. It was already very dark, and the group of Llaneros
lifting the patient, with others holding up lighted torches made of rags
and tallow, and the humorous Esculapius leaning over the struggling
beast, presented a scene ludicrous in the extreme. In spite of the skill
with which he performed the operation, and the humane care of the owner,
the horse expired the same night.
[Illustration]
Three whole days were spent in the laborious occupation of forcing the
cattle across the river. Nor were the nights less diligently employed at
the village in the more entertaining recreation of dancing, flirting and
gambling, according to the tastes and inclinations of our motley
assembly. It must be confessed, however, that the latter had more
incentives for the people of that pastoral region than the shepherd’s
reed and crook. Occasionally a fight would occur during these nocturnal
revelries; but this, beyond some hard words and brandishing of swords
and daggers by moonlight, which rather added to the picturesqueness of
the scene, never ended in any thing very serious.
“Caló el chapeo, requirió la espada,
Miró al soslayo, fuése y no hubo nada.”
The river was now rising so rapidly, that in order to reach our camp in
the neighborhood of the village, we were obliged to place canoes across
the main street leading to it, for fear of coming in contact with any of
the numerous tenants of that stream. About this time the fish, conscious
of the approaching inundation of the savannas, commence to ascend the
river in search of those places best suited for spawning; and so great
is the number of those that seek a nuptial rendezvous, that the noise
they make in the water can be heard at some distance from the river.
During their migration the water becomes so tainted with their flavor,
that it is unfit to drink or wash in. Desirous of obtaining some live
specimens for sketching, I procured a _tarraya_, or throw net, which I
requested one of our men to launch near the bank; he did so; but when
he tried to lift it, he found it impossible unassisted, which made us
fear that the net had got entangled among snags at the bottom of the
river. A companion was called to our assistance, and between us three,
we soon brought it up, when, to my astonishment and delight, I found the
net full of _coporos_, _palometas_; and other delicacies; the caribes,
however, soon rendered it perfectly useless, which circumstance I
considered a misfortune, as I could not keep the fish long without
spoiling. Next day I was advised by one of the villagers to place three
or four canoes, partly filled with water, across the stream; the fish,
finding their progress arrested by the obstruction, endeavored to jump
over; in doing which they fell in the canoes by hundreds. The
contrivance succeeded so well, that every morning I could depend on a
plentiful supply, both for my sketch-book and the frying-pan. My
attention was particularly attracted this time by a large fish called
the _valenton_, from its great strength which, as I was informed,
enables him to drag a canoe after him when caught with the hook and
line. A distressing occurrence took place there which nearly cost the
life of a young man while engaged in fishing for the _valenton_. The
angler and a friend were engaged in conversation, with their lines
thrown carelessly over the sides of the canoe, when the fish seized the
bait and ran off, as he is in the habit of doing. The jerk was so
violent, that the young man was unable to hold the line, and allowed it
to slip through his hands; he was not aware that at the end of the line
there was another hook, which buried itself in the thumb of his right
hand; the next moment he was violently pitched in the water and dragged
for some distance, when fortunately the line broke, and he was picked up
almost insensible by his companion. During its gambols in the river, the
_valenton_ jumps sometimes three feet clear out of the water, raising a
large volume of spray and striking the surface with its powerful tail in
its fall; so great is the splash, that the noise can be heard a great
distance off, especially in the stillness of the night, when the fish
seems to be more busily engaged in hunting.
The _payara_ also delights at this time in those jumps so much dreaded
by fishermen,[46] and even by people wearing any red garment about their
persons; for this fish, like the caribe, is said to be attracted by that
color, just as wild bulls are; so much so that it often happens that one
of them springs on people thus attired in the canoes, though it always
pays dearly for its temerity, as, in consequence of the peculiar
structure of its jaws, the fish cannot disentangle itself from the
garment, to which it remains attached until released by the hand of its
intended victim, who is very glad of the chance thus unexpectedly thrown
in his way, for the payara is a most delicious fish, often weighing
twenty and thirty pounds, and withal very beautiful. Of this savage
propensity people avail themselves to capture this fish without hook or
line, on the large rivers, such as the Apure and Orinoco, where they
seem to be most daring; a piece of red flannel, or some other strong
material, tied to the end of a long rod, being sufficient for the sport:
the tempting bait is held over the side of the canoe a few inches above
the surface of the water, and no sooner does the fish perceive the
alluring decoy, than with one spring it seizes it and remains as firmly
attached to it, as if held by an iron bolt; for in addition to its
formidable row of teeth, which are long and sharp as needles, the payara
has on the lower jaw two very much elongated fangs that penetrate the
head through corresponding passages in it which allow the points to
protrude close to the eyes of the fish, and unless it tears off the
piece, as it often does to the naked and arnatto-stained Indian while
paddling his canoe, the payara perishes by its own arms.
Among the many eventful incidents of _la Independencia_ still fresh in
the memory of our Leader, he relates an anecdote in connection with the
_Libertador_, Simon Bolívar, in which both these champions of freedom
participated while engaged on an important reconnoissance during the
rainy season. The savannas being, as usual, overflowed for the most
part, and there being no other means of transportation than the frail
canoes of the country, the two chieftains were compelled to travel in
one of these over their inundated domain, with the assistance of two
Indian paddlers. Fish were so numerous, that numbers of them, disturbed
by the strokes of the paddles against the sides of the canoe, jumped in
all directions, while not a few fell amidst the distinguished
passengers. The Libertador who, like almost all great men, had also his
weak points, possessed a very nervous temperament, especially about
little things; therefore he felt quite uneasy at the unceremonious
intrusion from the finny inhabitants of his swampy realms, whose
movements he mistook for a mischievous propensity on their part to
attack the wayfarer. On the other hand, our Leader, who was always ready
to practise a good joke, seized the opportunity to occasionally tip the
canoe so as to make it ship water, and more fish along with it.
Whereupon his companion, who was not aware of the trick practised upon
him, imagining that the fish were becoming bolder as they advanced,
exclaimed in utter despair, “D----n it! _Compañero_, let us pull back,
for even the fish are savage in this country.”
When the waters subside, thousands, nay, millions remain struggling in
the ponds and little pools, left on the savannas, where they soon perish
and rot away, tainting the air with their effluvium. Some of them, like
the _curito_, a species of Silurus, covered with transverse plates
surrounding the body, have the power of living buried in the indurated
mud, from whence they are called to life again by the returning showers.
As they form a most delicious mess, they are eagerly sought by men and
women, who resort to these places armed with wicker baskets, and collect
great numbers of the fish before they are carried away by the increasing
inundation of the savannas.
A very singular belief, shared likewise, according to Sir Emerson
Tennent, by the people of Ceylon, exists in the Apure respecting fish
falling from the clouds. Alluding to this phenomenon, that ingenious
writer observes: “Both at Galle and Colombo in the southwest monsoon,
fish are popularly believed to have fallen from the clouds during
violent showers; but those found on the occasions that give rise to this
belief, consist of smallest fry, such as could be caught up by
water-spouts and vortices analogous to them, or otherwise blown on shore
from the surf; whereas those which suddenly appear in the replenished
tanks and in the hollows which they overflow, are mature and well-grown
fish. Besides, the latter are found under the circumstances I have
described, in all parts of the interior, whilst the prodigy of a
supposed fall of fish from the sky has been noticed, I apprehend, only
in the vicinity of the sea or of some inland water.”
Although the author further explains the phenomenon on the supposition
that some fish are endowed with the power of locomotion over land, while
others in a torpid state remain buried in the mud until the return of
the rainy season; yet, I have been assured by reliable persons that live
fish have been picked up in places where no such possible contingencies
could occur; for instance, upon the roofs of houses or amidst wide
plains far from running water. Most of those thus found are small, from
three to seven inches long; but none of them capable of living more than
twenty minutes out of water; and the father of the writer once even
witnessed a fall of _bocachicos_, a fish which seldom lives over five
minutes out of its own element.
In support of these views, which were embodied in my _Wild Scenes in
South America_, I now have the pleasure of adding the testimony of no
less an authority than Gosse, who has collected a number of authentic
examples of this phenomenon in his _Romance of Natural History_.
According to his statements, fish-showers have occurred in all parts of
the world, not even excepting his own country--England,--where, early in
1859, the newspapers of South Wales recorded a shower of fish in the
Valley of Aberdare. The repeated statements attracted more notice than
usual, and the Rev. John Griffith, the vicar of the parish, communicated
the results of his inquiries to the _Evening Mail_.
“If now we look to other lands,” continues the author, “we shall find
that the descent of fishes from the atmosphere, under conditions little
understood, is a phenomenon which rests on indubitable evidence.
Humboldt has published interesting details of the ejection of fish in
large quantities from volcanoes in South America. On the night between
the 19th and 20th of June, 1698, the summit of Carguairazo, a volcano
more than 19,000 feet in height, fell in, and the surrounding country
for nearly thirty-two square miles was covered with mud and fishes. A
similar eruption of fish from the volcano of Imbabura was supposed to
have been the cause of a putrid fever which raged in the town of Ibarra
seven years before that period.”
This is accounted for on the supposition that subterraneous lakes,
communicating with surface-waters, form in cavities in the declivities,
or at the base of a volcano. In the course of time these internal
cavities are burst open by the force of the volcanic explosions, and
their contents discharged through the water.
But the most extraordinary account recorded by Gosse is that of Dr.
Buist, of Bombay, who, after enumerating the cases above cited, and
others of similar character, goes on to say:--“In 1824 fishes fell at
Meerut on the men of her Majesty’s 14th Regiment, then out at drill, and
were caught in numbers. In July, 1826, live fish were seen to fall on
the grass at Moradabad during a storm. They were the common _Cyprinus_,
so prevalent in our Indian waters. On the 19th of February, 1830, at
noon, a heavy fall of fish occurred at the Nokulhatty factory, in the
Daccah Zillah; depositions on the subject were obtained from nine
different parties. The fish were all dead; most of them were large; some
were fresh; others were rotten and mutilated. They were seen at first in
the sky, like a flock of birds, descending rapidly to the ground; there
was rain drizzling, but no storm. On the 16th and 17th of May, 1833, a
fall of fish occurred in the Zillah of Foottehpoor, about three miles
north of Jumna, after a violent storm of wind and rain. The fish were
from a pound and a half to three pounds in weight, and the same species
as those found in the tanks in the neighborhood. They were all dead and
dry. A fall of fish occurred at Allahabad during a storm in May, 1835;
they were of the chowla species, and were found dead and dry after the
storm had passed over the district. On the 20th of September, 1839,
after a smart shower of rain, a quantity of fish, about three inches in
length, and all of the same kind, fell at the Sunderbunds, about twenty
miles south of Calcutta. On this occasion it was remarked that the fish
did not fall here and there irregularly over the ground, but in a
continuous straight line, not more than a span in breadth. The vast
multitudes of fish with which the low grounds around Bombay are covered,
about a week or ten days after the first burst of the monsoon, appear to
be derived from the adjoining pools or rivulets, and not to descend from
the sky. They are not, as far as I know, found in the higher parts of
the island. I have never seen them, though I have watched carefully, in
casks collecting water from the roofs of buildings, or heard of them on
the decks or awnings of vessels in the harbor, where they must have
appeared had they descended from the sky. One of the most remarkable
phenomena of this kind occurred during a tremendous deluge of rain at
Kattywar, on the 25th of July, 1850, where the ground around Rajkote was
found literally covered with fish; some of them were found on the top of
haystacks, where probably they had been drifted by the storm. In the
course of twenty-four successive hours twenty-seven inches of rain fell;
thirty-five fell in twenty-six hours, seven inches in one hour and a
half, being the heaviest fall on record. At Poonah, on the 3d of August,
1852, after a very heavy fall of rain, multitudes of fish were caught on
the ground in the cantonments, full half a mile from the nearest stream.
If showers of fish are to be explained on the assumption that they are
carried up by squalls or violent winds from rivers or spaces of water
not far away from where they fall, it would be nothing wonderful were
they seen to descend from the air during the furious squalls which
occasionally occur in July.”
Sir E. Tennent, before cited, also witnessed in Ceylon another of those
fish-showers:--“I had an opportunity, on one occasion only, of
witnessing the phenomenon which gives rise to this popular belief. I was
driving in the cinnamon gardens near the fort of Colombo, and saw a
violent but partial shower descend at no great distance before me. On
coming to the spot, I found a multitude of small silvery fish, from one
and a half to two inches in length, leaping on the gravel of the high
road, numbers of which I collected and brought away in my palanquin. The
spot was about half a mile from the sea, and entirely unconnected with
any water-course or pool.”[47]
The same curious fact respecting the habits of certain kinds of fish in
the _Llanos_, which bury themselves in the mud at the close of the rainy
season, also appears to take place in India and Ceylon; for, according
to Gosse, “the pools, reservoirs, and tanks are well provided with fish
of various species, though the water twice every year becomes perfectly
evaporated, and the mud of the bottom is entirely converted into dust,
or takes the condition of baked clay, gaping with wide and deep clefts,
in which not the slightest sign of moisture can be detected. This is the
case with temporary hollows in the soil, which have no connection with
running streams or permanent waters, from which they might be supposed
to receive a fresh stock of fish.”
After proving conclusively that these fishes could not proceed from
either the clouds, as the generality of people believe, nor from
impregnated ova, as Mr. Farrell suggests, the author observes:--“Neither
of these hypotheses, then, will account for the fact; and we must admit
that the fishes of these regions, have the instinct to burrow down in
the solid mud of the bottom, at the approach of the dry season, and the
power of retaining life, doubtless in a torpid condition, until the
return of the periodic rains, as Theophrastus long ago observed.”
But, who ever heard of showers of toads and frogs? Yet, such is the
fact, astonished reader; and were you to visit with me some of the
lagoons and ponds of South America at night, you would not fail to
notice that the air, as well as the earth and waters, seems filled with
the piercing, deafening noise proceeding from them. “According to
travellers in tropical America, the inhabitants of Porto Bello assert
that every drop of rain is changed into a toad; the most instructed,
however, believe that the spawn of these animals is raised with the
vapor from the adjoining swamps, and, being driven in the clouds over
the city, the ova are hatched as they descend in rain. ’Tis certain that
the streets after a night of heavy rain are almost covered with the
ill-favored reptiles; and it is impossible to walk without crushing
them. But heretic philosophers point to the mature growth of the vermin,
many of them being six inches in length, and maintain that the
hypothesis just mentioned will scarcely account for the appearance of
these.”[48]
But it is not South America alone that can boast of such an
extraordinary phenomenon; for the same accomplished author records
similar showers as occurring in England and various parts of the
Continent: “In two or three of these cases, the toads were not only
observed in countless numbers on the ground during and after heavy
storms of rain, but were seen to strike upon the roofs of houses,
bounding thence into the streets; they even fell upon the hats, and, in
one instance, were actually received into the outstretched hand.”
It would seem that not even quadrupeds are exempt there, from the same
rule, for we often hear the phrase in English, “If it should rain cats
and dogs,” which I, for want of a better acquaintance with English
phraseology, am at a loss how to interpret. We all know that
stone-showers are not uncommon, especially ever since “the thunderer,”
Jupiter, _alias_ Jove, lost his power among us through the advancing
strides of civilization. Previous to this, we are told of his paying
occasional visits to his lady-loves on earth in the shape of golden
showers, which have been exchanged subsequently for a less costly
material; but showers of “cats and dogs” I do not believe ever occurred,
even to an old sinner like him.