Across Unknown South America Part 48

On this magnificent island we halted at five o'clock in the afternoon, and I took alt.i.tude observations with the hypsometrical apparatus: 1,062 ft. above the sea level.

We were again lucky in fishing that evening. We caught six _trahiras_, several _pacus_, and two young _jahus_--altogether some 120 lb. in weight. My men had wasted so much food, and so much had been spoiled by constant immersions--many of the tinned meats had been altogether spoiled by the tins having got rusty and gradually perforated--that I was beginning to feel rather anxious in case our journey should last longer than I expected. Unfortunately, we had lost most of our salt, and we had no way of preserving the fish, which we had to leave on the banks, absolutely wasted. In order, however, to show how lazy my men were, it is enough to say that, rather than take the slight trouble of placing some pieces of the excellent fish on board the canoe instead of trusting entirely to the luck we might have in fishing the next evening, they had to go the entire day without food. For some reason or other we could not get a single fish to bite, and we did not find a single bird or monkey to shoot.

I was rather interested to observe, in looking over my notes, that nearly all the rocky barriers we had met stretching across the river extended from south-east to north-west. I believe that similar barriers stretched in the same direction in the other southern tributaries of the Amazon, the Xingu and the Madeira Rivers, but, curiously enough, this was not the case with the River Araguaya.

We had made our camp that particular night on a lovely beach of white sand, which I found perfectly delicious, but which my men hated, as there were no trees on which they could hang their hammocks. They did not like to go into the luxuriant forest of the beautiful island, as they were afraid to go too far away from me, and I did not wish to go too far away from the canoe, which we had beached on the gravel bank, in case the river should rise suddenly or something should happen to make her float away. As I have said, I never, during the entire journey, let that canoe go out of my sight for one single moment. The men, therefore, went into the forest to cut big poles, which they afterwards planted with much exertion, in the sand near my camp-bed.

Some amusing scenes happened during the night, when the poles gradually gave way with the weight of the men in the hammocks, and, tumbling down altogether, gave them severe blows on their heads and bodies.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Crocodile about to attack one of the Dogs of the Expedition.

Photographed by author at a distance of three metres (Rio Arinos-Juruena).]

The stars were simply magnificent in brilliancy as I lay on my camp-bed.

One particularly, to 290 b.m. N.W.--the planet Venus--was extraordinarily brilliant, appearing six times as big as any other planet visible that night. It threw off radiations of wonderful luminosity, quite strong enough to illuminate with a whitish light a great circular surface of the sky around it.

In the morning, before we left, Alcides--who loved carving names and inscriptions on every tree and stone--duly incised the name of Antonio Prado, with which I baptized the island in honour of the greatest Brazilian living, upon a giant _figueira_ tree on the southern edge of the extensive beach of sand and gravel.

CHAPTER IX

Dogs--Macaws--Crocodiles--A Serious Accident--Men flung into a Whirlpool--The Loss of Provisions and Valuable Baggage--More Dangerous Rapids--Wonderful Scenery--Dangerous Work--On the Edge of a Waterfall--A Risky Experience--Bravery of Author's Brazilian Followers--A High Wind from the North-East--A Big Lake

THE night was heavy and damp. All our things were soaked in the morning with the dew which had fallen. We were enveloped in a thick mist when we woke up. It became a dense fog when the sun rose, and did not clear up until the sun was fairly high above the horizon. The minimum temperature during the night had been 62 F. (July 22nd).

We were unable to leave until eight o'clock, as the river was dangerous enough when we could see where we were going, and it would have been rather foolish to add one more risk to our travelling in the fog.

My men were extremely irritable and morose that morning, and even our dogs were most troublesome. We had had a great deal of trouble with the dogs; they were as disobedient and untrainable as the men. Nearly every morning we had to waste a considerable time in getting the animals back into the canoe. When we were ready to start they generally dashed away into the forest and the men had to go and fetch them and bring them back. That particular morning one dog--the best we had--escaped, and my men searched for more than an hour, but were unable to find him. In trying to run after him they got their feet full of thorns, and they became so enraged that they decided to abandon the dog on the island. I called him for more than half an hour, trying to save his life, but the animal refused to come. So, much to my sorrow, we had to pull out without him, and undoubtedly the poor beast eventually must have died of starvation, as there was no food whatever to be obtained in the forest on the island.

The dogs were quite amusing to watch while in the canoe, their terror when we shot rapids being quite manifest. They were an additional source of danger to us, for once or twice while shooting rapids strewn with rocks they would jump out of the canoe on to the rocks as we were shaving past them, and we lost much time on several occasions in order to rescue them. In going through the forest the poor animals had suffered much from the attacks of ants and all kinds of insects, many parasites having got inside their ears and where the skin was softer under their legs, causing terrible sores.

They never got fond of anybody, no matter how well they were treated. In fact, unlike all other dogs of any other country, they never seemed even to recognize any of us. Alcides had become the owner of the abandoned dog in a peculiar way at the beginning of our journey, when travelling with my caravan of mules. The dog was going along with a man travelling in the opposite direction to ours. Alcides, who at the time was eating some bread, whistled to the dog, and from that moment the animal left his master and came along with us.

Perhaps Brazilian dogs do not give affection because they never receive any. They were so timid that when you lifted your hand to caress them they would dash away yelling, with their tails between their legs, as if you had been about to strike them. I tried time after time to make friends with them--and I am generally quick at making friends with animals--but I gave up in despair the hope of gaining the slightest affection from those dogs.

When we came to the end of the island we found another great barrier of foliated rock extending from east to west, 500 m. across. The basin showed, moreover, three sets of giant rocks on the left side. In the north-easterly part where the river narrowed again there stood a range of hills 300 ft. high, extending from west to east, and parallel to the rocky barrier across the basin. A streamlet 3 m. wide coming from the south-west entered the Arinos from the left bank. The hill range which stood along the right bank of the river showed a rocky formation of a greyish colour right up to its summit, and was, in fact, a mere great rocky barrier with only a few trees growing in interstices which had been filled with earth and sand. The southern aspect of the range was an almost vertical wall.

The river was proceeding mostly in a westerly and north-westerly direction for long stretches of 3,500 m., 4,000 m., 2,000 m., until we came to an equilateral-triangular island, 300 m. each side--Erminia Island. A small channel not more than 20 m. across separated this from an irregularly-shaped island, 600 m. long--Niobe Island. After this came a low island of sand and gravel 5 ft. high and 300 m. long, with merely a few trees upon it, whereas the other two islands were covered with dense and most beautiful vegetation. The main channel of the river was 400 m.

wide.

_Araras_ (macaws) of great size and of a beautiful vermilion colour flew overhead, shrieking wildly at the sight of us. We began to find a great many _jacares_ (_Caiman fissipis_) or crocodiles. I saw one sleeping placidly on an islet of gravel. I landed and photographed it, subsequently waking it with a start by throwing a stone at it. My men, who were following cautiously behind me, opened a fusillade and killed it.

It was really amusing to watch the astonishment of the few animals and birds we met in that deserted part of Brazil, as none of them had seen a human being. They evidently did not know what to make of us. They generally looked with curiosity and surprise, and my men could fire shot after shot before they would attempt to run, or, if they were birds, fly away.

There were in that region some fine specimens of the _cigana_ (_Opisthocomus cristatus_) and of the _jacu_ (_Penelope cristata_). The _cigana_ was beautiful to look at, with brown and yellow stripes, not unlike a pheasant, and a tuft of bright yellow feathers on the head. All of a sudden we came upon great numbers of these birds, and they supplied us with good meals.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Terrifying Rapid shot by Author and his Men in their Canoe.]

There were again plenty of rubber trees in the forest, plenty of fish in the river. The climate was not too hot--merely 87 F. in the shade, 105 in the sun--the insects not too troublesome; so that it seemed to us a paradise on earth.

We had now before us a great expanse of 5,000 m. of straight river to 345 b.m., with two parallel ranges of hills extending from west to east.

The second range was the higher of the two--some 600 ft., whereas the first was only 200 ft. high.

What I took to be a great river coming from 75 b.m. (N.E.), 250 m. wide, joined the Arinos from the right side; but I was puzzled whether this was not a mere arm of the Arinos. In the quick survey I was making, and with the many things which occupied my mind at every moment, the river being moreover so wide, it was impossible, single-handed, to survey everything carefully on every side. Therefore this may have been a mere arm of the Arinos which I mistook for a tributary. It was not possible for me to deviate from my course every moment to go and ascertain problematic details, but it will be quite easy for subsequent travellers to clear up this point now that attention has been drawn to it.

An island, 1,000 m. long--Olivia Island--was found at the point where the main arm of the river flowed in a direction of 345 b.m., and where to the north-west, north, and north-east, three hill ranges were before us--one 300 ft. high, extending from south-west to north-east on the left side of the river; another thickly wooded hill from west to east, also 300 ft. high; and yet another one, the highest of all, behind it from S.S.W. to N.N.E., on the right bank. The river was 350 m. wide, and its water almost stagnant.

Another barrier of rock held up the stream. We came to an island 800 m.

long, 300 m. wide--Sabrina Island--on the left side of the stream, which showed a beautiful spit of white sand at its southern end.

I halted on the bank where the island began in order to take observations for lat.i.tude and longitude, and as the day was a very clear one I took forty-eight consecutive sights of the sun with the s.e.xtant. Lat. 10 35'1 S.; long. 58 12' W. While I was busy observing the sun I thought I heard curious noises in the forest just behind me. The dogs all of a sudden jumped up, barking furiously, and I heard the sounds of what seemed an escaping person dashing away through the thick growth near the stream. My men were greatly excited, saying it was an Indian who had come quite close to me, and was about to shoot an arrow while I was busy with my s.e.xtant and chronometers. All through lunch they sat with their loaded rifles next to them, in case we might be attacked.

The river now flowed in a straight line for 5,000 m. in a north-westerly direction. Half-way along was a large triangular island--Pandora Island; then farther on the left another island, 2,000 m. long--Sibyl Island.

The river was of extraordinary beauty in that region. The tall range of hills to the north-west of us showed beautiful cobalt-blue tones against the whitish and grey sky; while the dark green foliage of the trees and the yellow blooms of the _Oleo pardo_ trees visible here and there, the immaculate white sandy beach along the water line, together with the brilliantly red and yellow rocks which stood out of the crystalline emerald water, formed indeed a beautiful scene for the painter's brush.

It did not do to be poetically inclined when travelling on the Arinos. I had hardly time to realize how beautiful that scene was when we found ourselves confronted by another big barrier of rocks, through which we went over a swift _corrideira_.

A basin was formed, 900 m. wide, with an extensive island of rock on the right side of it. Then we suddenly came to a terrible-looking rapid at an incline so steep that I foresaw trouble in store for us. There was no way of stopping anywhere, as the current was swiftly taking us down.

"We are lost!" shouted one man. "Jesus Maria Santissima!"

"Paddle away! paddle away, for Heaven's sake!" I shouted, as I knew that speed alone could save us from disaster.

Down went the canoe at an angle of 45 in the foaming and twisting waters of the rapid. Where the water curled right over itself the heavy canoe was lifted up in the air like a feather, and as I turned round to shout to Alcides to steer straight ahead I saw his expanded eyes looking in terror at the terrific whirlpool which was facing us at the bottom of the rapid.

"No! no!" cried Alcides.

"Straight--straight! For G.o.d's sake, straight!" shouted I; and as I saw the canoe swerve to the right I again shouted to Alcides to steer straight in order to avoid the dangerous part of the whirlpool.

Alcides would not steer straight, but steered us instead on the right for the very centre of the whirlpool. No sooner did the prow of the canoe enter the circle of the rotating water, which formed a deep concave hollow 70 or 80 m. in diameter, than, dipping her nose in the water, she was flung right up into the air, revolving on herself. Baggage and men all tumbled over, two men being thrown with terrific force clean out of the canoe. A lot of baggage disappeared into the whirlpool. The canoe, although filled with water, righted herself and spun round helplessly at an alarming speed. The impact had been so violent that the men, in tumbling over, had lost all the paddles except one.

We heard the cries of the two men in the water, and I saw them struggle in order to keep themselves afloat. I gave a sigh of relief that the two men--already a long distance from us--were, by a great stroke of luck, the only two who could swim. I urged them to have courage and we would come to their rescue, although for a moment I could not think how we should do it, as we had only one paddle left and the steering gear had got torn away from its socket, although Alcides with great courage had managed to save it. I ordered my men to paddle with their hands and with the large oar which was used for steering. We were tossed about in a terrific manner, the men and canoe going round and round the whirlpool in an absolutely helpless fashion.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Author's Men shooting a Crocodile.]

What distressed me more than anything was when I saw the two men getting nearer and nearer the centre, although they made a desperate struggle to swim away from it. In our effort to get to them by using the steering oar, the canoe, for some reason or other, swung round upon herself two or three times, and I saw with gladness the men gradually getting nearer. It was a moment of joy when I saw Antonio, who was a powerful swimmer, within only a few feet of the canoe. His face was ghastly, with an expression of terror upon it. He was quite exhausted, and was shouting pitifully for help. The man X was a few yards farther off.

The canoe suddenly swung round, going right against Antonio, who grasped the side of the boat and proceeded in such haste to climb on board that he came within an ace of capsizing her. A few moments later we were alongside of X, but he was so exhausted that he had not the strength to climb up. We seized him and with great difficulty lifted him inside the canoe.

We continued to go round and round the vortex in a helpless fashion, endeavouring with the steering oar to get out of that perilous position.

As I gazed around I saw my camp bed and bedding, which were enclosed in a water-tight canvas bag, still floating close to the centre of the whirlpool. Alas! a moment later they were sucked down. Most of our cooking utensils which were loose in the canoe had been washed overboard.

Two of our ca.s.seroles were floating gracefully in a circle round the whirlpool.

It is curious how people's mentality will work on such occasions. After we had been some minutes endeavouring to get away from the centre of the whirlpool, one of my men, who had recovered from the fright, saw the cooking pans, which were about to disappear. His first impulse was to shout that we must go and get them!