Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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This colossal gramen looks like the donax
of Italy.
This, the arundinaria of the Mississippi, (ludolfia,
Willd., miegia of Persoon,) and the bamboos, are the highest
gramens of the New Continent. Its seed has been carried to St.
Domingo, where its stalk is employed to thatch the negroes' huts.)
Towards evening we reached the Mission of Guanaguana, the site of
which is almost on a level with the village of San Antonio. The
missionary received us cordially; he was an old man, and he seemed
to govern his Indians with great intelligence. The village has
existed only thirty years on the spot it now occupies. Before that
time it was more to the south, and was backed by a hill. It is
astonishing with what facility the Indians are induced to remove
their dwellings. There are villages in South America which in less
than half a century have thrice changed their situation. The native
finds himself attached by ties so feeble to the soil he inhabits,
that he receives with indifference the order to take down his house
and to rebuild it elsewhere. A village changes its situation like a
camp. Wherever clay, reeds, and the leaves of the palm or heliconia
are found, a house is built in a few days. These compulsory changes
have often no other motive than the caprice of a missionary, who,
having recently arrived from Spain, fancies that the situation of
the Mission is feverish, or that it is not sufficiently exposed to
the winds.
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