Читать книгу: «The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866», страница 8

The secretion upon which he relies for defence, and which is the chief source of his unpopularity, while it affords good reasons against cultivating him as a pet, and mars his attractiveness as game, is by no means the greatest indignity that can be offered to a nose. It is a rank, living smell, and has none of the sickening qualities of disease or putrefaction. Indeed, I think a good smeller will enjoy its most refined intensity. It approaches the sublime, and makes the nose tingle. It is tonic and bracing, and, I can readily believe, has rare medicinal qualities. I do not recommend its use as eye-water, though an old farmer assures me it has undoubted virtues when thus applied. Hearing, one night, a disturbance among his hens, he rushed suddenly out to catch the thief, when Sir Mephitis, taken by surprise, and, no doubt, much annoyed at being interrupted, discharged the vials of his wrath full in the farmer's face, and with such admirable effect, that, for a few moments, he was completely blinded, and powerless to revenge himself upon the rogue; but he declared that afterwards his eyes felt as if purged by fire, and his sight was much clearer.

In March, that brief summary of a bear, the raccoon, comes out of his den in the ledges, and leaves his sharp digitigrade track upon the snow,—travelling not unfrequently in pairs,—a lean, hungry couple, bent on pillage and plunder. They have an unenviable time of it,—feasting in the summer and fall, hibernating in winter, and starving in spring. In April, I have found the young of the previous year creeping about the fields, so reduced by starvation as to be quite helpless, and offering no resistance to my taking them up by the tail, and carrying them home.

But with March our interest in these phases of animal life, which winter has so emphasized and brought out, begins to decline. Vague rumors are afloat in the air of a great and coming change. We are eager for Winter to be gone, since he too is fugitive, and cannot keep his place. Invisible hands deface his icy statuary; his chisel has lost its cunning. The drifts, so pure and exquisite, are now earth-stained and weather-worn,—the flutes and scallops, and fine, firm lines, all gone; and what was a grace and an ornament to the hills is now a disfiguration. Like worn and unwashed linen appear the remains of that spotless robe with which he clothed the world as his bride.

But he will not abdicate without a struggle. Day after day he rallies his scattered forces, and night after night pitches his white tents on the hills, and forges his spears at the eaves and by the dripping rocks; but the young Prince in every encounter prevails. Slowly and reluctantly the gray old hero retreats up the mountain, till finally the south rain comes in earnest, and in a night he is dead.

TO HERSA

 
Maiden, there is something more
Than raiment to adore;
Thou must have more than a dress,
More than any mode or mould,
More than mortal loveliness,
To captivate the cold.
 
 
Bow the knightly when they bow,
To a star behind the brow,—
Not to marble, not to dust,
But to that which warms them;
Not to contour nor to bust,
But to that which forms them,—
Not to languid lid nor lash,
Satin fold nor purple sash,
But unto the living flash
So mysteriously hid
Under lash and under lid.
 
 
But, vanity of vanities,—
If the red-rose in a young cheek lies,
Fatal disguise!
For the most terrible lances
Of the true, true knight
Are his bold eyebeams;
And every time that he opens his eyes,
The falsehood that he looks on dies.
 
 
If the heavenly light be latent,
It can need no earthly patent.
Unbeholden unto art—
Fashion or lore,
Scrip or store,
Earth or ore—
Be thy heart,
Which was music from the start,
Music, music to the core!
 
 
Music, which, though voiceless,
Can create
Both form and fate,
As Petrarch could a sonnet
That, taking flesh upon it,
Spirit-noiseless,
Doth the same inform and fill
With a music sweeter still!
Lives and breathes and palpitates,
Moves and moulds and animates,
And sleeps not from its duty
Till the maid in whom 'tis pent—
From a mortal rudiment,
From the earth-cell
And the love-cell,
By the birth-spell
And the love-spell—
Come to beauty.
 
 
Beauty, that, (Celestial Child,
From above,
Born of Wisdom and of Love,)
Can never die!
That ever, as she passeth by,
But casteth down the mild
Effulgence of her eye,
And, lo! the broken heart is healed,
The maimed, perverted soul
Ariseth and is whole!
That ever doing the fair deed,
And therein taking joy,
(A pure and priceless meed
That of this earth hath least alloy,)
It comes at last,
All mischance forever past,—
Every beautiful procedure
Manifest in form and feature,—
To be revealed:
There walks the earth an heavenly creature!
 
 
Beauty is music mute,—
Music's flower and fruit,
Music's creature—
Form and feature—
Music's lute.
Music's lute be thou,
Maiden of the starry brow!
(Keep thy heart true to know how!)
A Lute which he alone,
As all in good time shall be shown,
Shall prove, and thereby make his own,
Who is god enough to play upon it.
 
 
Happy, happy maid is she
Who is wedded unto Truth:
Thou shalt know him when he comes,
(Welcome youth!)
Not by any din of drums,
Nor the vantage of his airs;
Neither by his crown,
Nor his gown,
Nor by anything he wears.
He shall only well known be
By the holy harmony
That his coming makes in thee!
 

AN AMAZONIAN PICNIC

It was about half past six o'clock on the morning of the 27th of October, 1865, that we left Manaos, (or as the maps usually call it, Barra do Rio Negro,) on an excursion to the Lake of Hyanuary, on the western side of the Rio Negro. The morning was unusually fresh for these latitudes, and a strong wind was blowing up so heavy a sea in the river, that, if it did not actually make one sea-sick, it certainly called up very vivid and painful associations. We were in a large eight-oared custom-house barge, our company consisting of his Excellency, Dr. Epaminondas, President of the Province,² his secretary, Senhor Codicera, Senhor Tavares Bastos, the distinguished young deputy from the Province of Alagoas, Major Coutinho, of the Brazilian Engineer Service, Mr. Agassiz and myself, Mr. Bourkhardt, his artist, and two of our volunteer assistants. We were preceded by a smaller boat, an Indian montaria, in which was our friend and kind host, Senhor Honorio, who had undertaken to provide for our creature comforts, and had the care of a boatful of provisions. After an hour's row we left the rough waters of the Rio Negro, and rounding a wooded point, turned into one of those narrow, winding igarapés (literally, "boat-paths"), with green forest walls, which make the charm of canoe excursions in this country. A ragged drapery of long, faded grass hung from the lower branches of the trees, marking the height of the last rise of the river,—some eighteen or twenty feet above its present level. Here and there a white heron stood on the shore, his snowy plumage glittering in the sunlight; numbers of ciganas (the pheasants of the Amazons) clustered in the bushes; once a pair of king vultures rested for a moment within gunshot, but flew out of sight as our canoe approached; and now and then an alligator showed his head above water. As we floated along through this picturesque channel, so characteristic of the wonderful region to which we were all more or less strangers,—for even Dr. Epaminondas and Senhor Tavares Bastos were here for the first time,—the conversation turned naturally enough upon the nature of this Amazonian Valley, its physical conformation, its origin and resources, its history past and to come, both alike and obscure, both the subject of wonder and speculation. Senhor Tavares Bastos, although not yet thirty, is already distinguished in the politics of his country; and from the moment he entered upon public life to the present time, the legislation in regard to the Amazons, its relation to the future progress and development of the Brazilian empire, has been the object of his deepening interest. He is a leader in that class of men who advocate the most liberal policy in this matter, and has already urged upon his countrymen the importance, even from selfish motives, of sharing their great treasure with the world. He was little more than twenty years of age when he published his papers on the opening of the Amazons, which have done more, perhaps, than anything else of late years to attract attention to the subject.

There are points where the researches of the statesman and the investigator meet, and natural science is not without its influence, even on the practical bearings of this question. Shall this region be legislated for as sea or land? Shall the interests of agriculture or navigation prevail in its councils? Is it essentially aquatic or terrestrial? Such were some of the inquiries which came up in the course of the discussion. A region of country which stretches across a whole continent, and is flooded for half the year, where there can never be railroads, or highways, or even pedestrian travelling, to any great extent, can hardly be considered as dry land. It is true that, in this oceanic river system, the tidal action has an annual, instead of a daily, ebb and flow; that its rise and fall obey a larger light, and are regulated by the sun, and not the moon; but it is nevertheless subject to all the conditions of a submerged district, and must be treated as such. Indeed, these semiannual changes of level are far more powerful in their influence on the life of the inhabitants than any marine tides. People sail half the year over districts where, for the other half, they walk, though hardly dry-shod, over the soaked ground; their occupations, their dress, their habits, are modified in accordance with the dry and wet seasons. And not only the ways of life, but the whole aspect of the country, the character of the landscape, are changed. At this moment there are two most picturesque falls in the neighborhood of Manaos,—the Great and Little Cascades, as they are called,—favorite resorts for bathing, picnics, etc., which, in a few months, when the river shall have risen above their highest level, will have completely disappeared. Their bold rocks and shady nooks will have become river-bottom. All that one hears or reads of the extent of the Amazons and its tributaries does not give one an idea of its immensity as a whole. One must float for months upon its surface, in order to understand how fully water has the mastery over land along its borders. Its watery labyrinth is not so much a network of rivers, as an ocean of fresh water cut up and divided by land, the land being often nothing more than an archipelago of islands in its midst. The valley of the Amazons is indeed an aquatic, not a terrestrial, basin; and it is not strange, when looked upon from this point of view, that its forests should be less full of life, comparatively, than its rivers.

But while we were discussing these points, talking of the time when the banks of the Amazons will teem with a population more active and vigorous than any it has yet seen,—when all civilized nations shall share in its wealth,—when the twin continents will shake hands, and Americans of the North come to help Americans of the South in developing its resources,—when it will be navigated from north to south, as well as from east to west, and small steamers will run up to the head-waters of all its tributaries,—while we were speculating on these things, we were approaching the end of our journey; and, as we neared the lake, there issued from its entrance a small, two-masted canoe, evidently bound on some official mission, for it carried the Brazilian flag, and was adorned with many brightly colored streamers. As it drew near we heard music; and a salvo of rockets, the favorite Brazilian artillery on all festive occasions, whether by day or night, shot up into the air. Our arrival had been announced by Dr. Carnavaro of Manaos, who had come out the day before to make some preparations for our reception, and this was a welcome to the President on his first visit to the Indian village. When they came within speaking distance, a succession of hearty cheers went up for the President; for Tavares Bastos, whose character as the political advocate of the Amazons makes him especially welcome here; for Major Coutinho, already well known from his former explorations in this region; and for the strangers within their gates,—for the Professor and his party. When the reception was over, they fell into line behind our boat, and so we came into the little port with something of state and ceremony.

This pretty Indian village is hardly recognized as a village at once, for it consists of a number of sitios (palm-thatched houses), scattered through the forest; and though the inhabitants look on each other as friends and neighbors, yet from our landing-place only one sitio was to be seen,—that at which we were to stay. It stood on a hill which sloped gently up from the lake shore, and consisted of a mud house,—the rough frame being filled in and plastered with mud,—containing two rooms, beside several large palm-thatched sheds outside. The word shed, which we connect with a low, narrow out-house, gives no correct idea, however, of this kind of structure, universal throughout the Indian settlements, and common also among the whites. The space enclosed is generally large, the sloping roof of palm-thatch is lifted very high on poles made of the trunks of trees, thus allowing a free circulation of air, and there are usually no walls at all. They are great open porches, or verandas, rather than sheds. One of these rooms was used for the various processes by which the mandioca root is transformed into farinha, tapioca, and tucupi, a kind of intoxicating liquor. It was furnished with the large clay ovens, covered with immense shallow copper pans, for drying the farinha, with the troughs for kneading the mandioca, the long straw tubes for expressing the juice, and the sieves for straining the tapioca. The mandioca room is an important part of every Indian sitio; for the natives not only depend, in a great degree, upon the different articles manufactured from this root for their own food, but it makes an essential part of the commerce of the Amazons. Another of these open rooms was a kitchen; while a third, which served as our dining-room, is used on festa days and occasional Sundays as a chapel. It differed from the rest in having the upper end closed in with a neat thatched wall, against which, in time of need, the altar-table may stand, with candles and rough prints or figures of the Virgin and Saints. A little removed from this more central part of the establishment was another smaller mud house, where most of the party arranged their hammocks; Mr. Agassiz and myself being accommodated in the other one, where we were very hospitably received by the senhora of the sitio, an old Indian woman, whose gold ornaments, necklace, and ear-rings were rather out of keeping with her calico skirt and cotton waist. This is, however, by no means an unusual combination here. Beside the old lady, the family consisted, at this moment, of her afilhada (god-daughter), with her little boy, and several other women employed about the place; but it is difficult to judge of the population of the sitios now, because a great number of the men have been taken as recruits for the war with Paraguay, and others are hiding in the forest for fear of being pressed into the same service.

The breakfast-table, covered with dishes of fish fresh from the lake, and dressed in a variety of ways, with stewed chicken, rice, etc., was by no means an unwelcome sight, as it was already eleven o'clock, and we had had nothing since rising, at half past five in the morning, except a hot cup of coffee; nor was the meal the less appetizing that it was spread under the palm-thatched roof of our open, airy dining-room, surrounded by the forest, and commanding a view of the lake and wooded hillside opposite, the little landing below, where were moored our barge with its white awning, the gay canoe, and two or three Indian montarias, making the foreground of the picture. After breakfast our party dispersed, some to rest in their hammocks, others to hunt or fish, while Mr. Agassiz was fully engaged in examining a large basket of fish,—Tucunarés, Acaras, Curimatas, Surubims, etc.,—just brought in from the lake for his inspection, and showing again what every investigation demonstrates afresh, namely, the distinct localization of species in every different water-basin, be it river, lake, igarapé, or forest pool. Though the scientific results of the expedition have no place in this little sketch of a single excursion, let me make a general statement as to Mr. Agassiz's collections, to give you some idea of his success. Since arriving in Pará, although his exploration of the Amazonian waters is but half completed, he has collected more species than were known to exist in the whole world fifty years ago. Up to this time, something more than a hundred species of fish were known to science from the Amazons;³ Mr. Agassiz has already more than eight hundred on hand, and every day adds new treasures. He is himself astonished at this result, revealing a richness and variety in the distribution of life throughout these waters of which he had formed no conception. As his own attention has been especially directed to their localization and development, his collection of fishes is larger than any other; still, with the help of his companions, volunteers as well as regular assistants, he has a good assortment of specimens from all the other classes of the animal kingdom likewise.

One does not see much of the world between one o'clock and four in this climate. These are the hottest hours of the day, and there are few who can resist the temptation of the cool swinging hammock, slung in some shady spot within doors or without. I found a quiet retreat by the lake shore, where, though I had a book in my hand, the wind in the trees overhead, and the water rippling softly around the montarias moored at my side, lulled me into that mood of mind when one may be lazy without remorse or ennui, and one's highest duty seems to be to do nothing. The monotonous notes of a violon, a kind of lute or guitar, came to me from a group of trees at a little distance, where our boatmen were resting in the shade, the red fringes of their hammocks giving to the landscape just the bit of color which it needed. Occasionally a rustling flight of paroquets or ciganas overhead startled me for a moment, or a large pirarucu plashed out of the water; but except for these sounds, Nature was silent, and animals as well as men seemed to pause in the heat and seek shelter.

Dinner brought us all together again at the close of the afternoon in our airy banqueting-hall. As we were with the President, our picnic was of a much more magnificent character than are our purely scientific excursions, of which we have had many. On such occasions, we are forced to adapt our wants to our means; and the make-shifts to which we are obliged to resort, if they are sometimes inconvenient, are often very amusing. But now, instead of teacups doing duty as tumblers, empty barrels serving as chairs, and the like incongruities, we had a silver soup tureen and a cook and a waiter, and knives and forks enough to go round, and many other luxuries which such wayfarers as ourselves learn to do without. While we were dining, the Indians began to come in from the surrounding forest to pay their respects to the President; for his visit was the cause of great rejoicing, and there was to be a ball in his honor in the evening. They brought an enormous cluster of game as an offering. What a mass of color it was, looking more like an immense bouquet of flowers than like a bunch of birds! It was composed entirely of toucans with their red and yellow beaks, blue eyes, and soft white breasts bordered with crimson, and of parrots, or papagaios, as they call them here, with their gorgeous plumage of green, blue, purple, and red.

When we had dined we took coffee outside, while our places around the table were filled by the Indian guests, who were to have a dinner-party in their turn. It was pleasant to see with how much courtesy several of the Brazilian gentlemen of our party waited upon these Indian senhoras, passing them a variety of dishes, helping them to wine, and treating them with as much attention as if they had been the highest ladies of the land. They seemed, however, rather shy and embarrassed, scarcely touching the nice things placed before them, till one of the gentlemen who has lived a good deal among the Indians, and knows their habits perfectly, took the knife and fork from one of them, exclaiming,—"Make no ceremony, and don't be ashamed; eat with your fingers, all of you, as you're accustomed to do, and then you'll find your appetites and enjoy your dinner." His advice was followed; and I must say they seemed much more comfortable in consequence, and did better justice to the good fare. Although the Indians who live in the neighborhood of the towns have seen too much of the conventionalities of civilization not to understand the use of a knife and fork, no Indian will eat with one if he can help it; and, strange to say, there are many of the whites in the upper Amazonian settlements who have adopted the same habits. I have dined with Brazilian senhoras of good class and condition, belonging to the gentry of the land, who, although they provided a very nice service for their guests, used themselves only the implements with which Nature had provided them.

When the dinner was over, the room was cleared of the tables, and swept; the music, consisting of a guitar, flute, and violin, called in; and the ball was opened. At first the forest belles were rather shy in the presence of strangers; but they soon warmed up, and began to dance with more animation. They were all dressed in calico or muslin skirts, with loose white cotton waists, finished around the neck with a kind of lace they make themselves by drawing out the threads from cotton or cambric so as to form an open pattern, sewing those which remain over and over to secure them. Much of this lace is quite elaborate, and very fine. Many of them had their hair dressed either with white jessamine or with roses stuck into their round combs, and several wore gold beads and ear-rings. Some of the Indian dances are very pretty; but one thing is noticeable, at least in all that I have seen. The man makes all the advances, while the woman is coy and retiring, her movements being very languid. Her partner throws himself at her feet, but does not elicit a smile or a gesture; he stoops, and pretends to be fishing, making motions as if he were drawing her in with a line; he dances around her, snapping his fingers as though playing on the castanets, and half encircling her with his arms; but she remains reserved and cold. Now and then they join together in something like a waltz; but this is only occasionally, and for a moment. How different from the negro dances, of which we saw many in the neighborhood of Rio! In those the advances come chiefly from the women, and are not always of a very modest character.

The moon was shining brightly over lake and forest, and the ball was gayer than ever, at ten o'clock, when I went to my room, or rather to the room where my hammock was slung, and which I shared with Indian women and children, with a cat and her family of kittens, who slept on the edge of my mosquito-net, and made frequent inroads upon the inside, with hens and chickens and sundry dogs, who went in and out at will. The music and dancing, the laughter and talking outside, continued till the small hours. Every now and then an Indian girl would come in to rest for a while, take a nap in a hammock, and then return to the dance. When we first arrived in South America, we could hardly have slept soundly under such circumstances; but one soon becomes accustomed, on the Amazons, to sleeping in rooms with mud floors and mud walls, or with no walls at all, where rats and birds and bats rustle about in the thatch over one's head, and all sorts of unwonted noises in the night remind you that you are by no means the sole occupant of your apartment. This remark does not apply to the towns, where the houses are comfortable enough; but if you attempt to go off the beaten track, to make canoe excursions, and see something of the forest population, you must submit to these inconveniences. There is one thing, however, which makes it far pleasanter to lodge in the Indian houses here than in the houses of our poorer class at home. One is quite independent in the matter of bedding; no one travels without his own hammock and the net which in many places is a necessity on account of the mosquitoes. Beds and bedding are almost unknown here; and there are none so poor as not to possess two or three of the strong and neat twine hammocks made by the Indians themselves from the fibres of the palm. Then the open character of their houses, as well as the personal cleanliness of the Indians, makes the atmosphere fresher and purer there than in the houses of our poor. However untidy they may be in other respects, they always bathe once or twice a day, if not oftener, and wash their clothes frequently. We have never yet entered an Indian house where there was any disagreeable odor, unless it might be the peculiar smell from the preparation of the mandioca in the working-room outside, which has, at a certain stage in the process, a slightly sour smell. We certainly could not say as much for many houses where we have lodged when travelling in the West, or even "Down East," where the suspicious look of the bedding and the close air of the room often make one doubtful about the night's rest.

We were up at five o'clock; for the morning hours are very precious in this climate, and the Brazilian day begins with the dawn. At six o'clock we had had coffee, and were ready for the various projects suggested for our amusement. Our sportsmen were already in the forest; others had gone off on a fishing excursion in a montaria; and I joined a party on a visit to a sitio higher up the lake. Mr. Agassiz, as has been constantly the case throughout our journey, was obliged to deny himself all these parties of pleasure; for the novelty and variety of the species of fish brought in kept him and his artist constantly at work. In this climate the process of decomposition goes on so rapidly, that, unless the specimens are attended to at once, they are lost; and the paintings must be made while they are quite fresh, in order to give any idea of their vividness of tint. We therefore left Mr. Agassiz busy with the preparation of his collections, and Mr. Bourkhardt painting, while we went up the lake through a strange, half-aquatic, half-terrestrial region, where the land seemed hardly redeemed from the water. Groups of trees rose directly from the lake, their roots hidden below its surface, while numerous blackened and decayed trunks stood up from the water in all sorts of picturesque and fantastic forms. Sometimes the trees had thrown down from their branches those singular aerial roots so common here, and seemed standing on stilts. Here and there, when we coasted along by the bank, we had a glimpse into the deeper forest, with its drapery of lianas and various creeping vines, and its parasitic sipos twining close around the trunks, or swinging themselves from branch to branch like loose cordage. But usually the margin of the lake was a gently sloping bank, covered with a green so vivid and yet so soft that it seemed as if the earth had been born afresh in its six months' baptism, and had come out like a new creation. Here and there a palm lifted its head above the line of the forest, especially the light, graceful Assai palm, with its tall, slender, smooth stem and crown of feathery leaves vibrating with every breeze.

Half an hour's row brought us to the landing of the sitio for which we were bound. Usually the sitios stand on the bank of the lake or river, a stone's throw from the shore, for convenience of fishing, bathing, etc. But this one was at some distance, with a very nicely-kept winding path leading through the forest; and as it was far the neatest and prettiest sitio I have seen here, I may describe it more at length. It stood on the brow of a hill which dipped down on the other side into a wide and deep ravine. Through this ravine ran an igarapé, beyond which the land rose again in an undulating line of hilly ground, most refreshing to the eye after the flat character of the upper Amazonian scenery. The fact that this sitio, standing now on a hill overlooking the valley and the little stream at its bottom, will have the water nearly flush with the ground around it when the igarapé is swollen by the rise of the river, gives an idea of the change of aspect between the dry and wet seasons. The establishment consisted of a number of buildings, the most conspicuous of which was a large and lofty open room, which the Indian senhora told me was their reception-room, and was often used, she said, by the brancos (whites) from Manaos and the neighborhood for an evening dance, when they came out in a large company, and passed the night. A low wall, some three or four feet in height, ran along the sides of this room, wooden benches being placed against them for their whole length. The two ends were closed from top to bottom by very neat thatched walls; the palm-thatch here, when it is made with care, being exceedingly pretty, fine, and smooth, and of a soft straw color. At the upper end stood an immense embroidery-frame, looking as if it might have served for Penelope's web, but in which was stretched an unfinished hammock of palm-thread, the senhora's work. She sat down on the low stool before it, and worked a little for my benefit, showing me how the two layers of transverse threads were kept apart by a thick, polished piece of wood, something like a long, broad ruler. Through the opening thus made the shuttle is passed with the cross-thread, which is then pushed down and straightened in its place by means of the same piece of wood.