Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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On The 16th Of April, Towards Evening, We Received Tidings That In
Less Than Six Hours Our Boat Had Passed The Rapids, And Had Arrived In
Good Condition In A Cove Called El Puerto De Arriba, Or The Port Of
The Expedition.
We were shown in the little church of Atures some
remains of the ancient wealth of the Jesuits.
A silver lamp of
considerable weight lay on the ground half-buried in the sand. Such an
object, it is true, would nowhere tempt the cupidity of a savage; yet
I may here remark, to the honor of the natives of the Orinoco, that
they are not addicted to stealing, like the less savage tribes of the
islands in the Pacific. The former have a great respect for property;
they do not even attempt to steal provision, hooks, or hatchets. At
Maypures and Atures, locks on doors are unknown: they will be
introduced only when whites and men of mixed race establish themselves
in the missions.
The Indians of Atures are mild and moderate, and accustomed, from the
effects of their idleness, to the greatest privations. Formerly, being
excited to labour by the Jesuits, they did not want for food. The
fathers cultivated maize, French beans (frijoles), and other European
vegetables; they even planted sweet oranges and tamarinds round the
villages; and they possessed twenty or thirty thousand head of cows
and horses, in the savannahs of Atures and Carichana. They had at
their service a great number of slaves and servants (peones), to tend
their herds. Nothing is now cultivated but a little cassava, and a few
plantains. Such however is the fertility of the soil, that at Atures I
counted on a single branch of a musa one hundred and eight fruits,
four or five of which would almost have sufficed for a man's daily
food. The culture of maize is entirely neglected, and the horses and
cows have entirely disappeared. Near the raudal, a part of the village
still bears the name of Passo del ganado (ford of the cattle), while
the descendants of those very Indians whom the Jesuits had assembled
in a mission, speak of horned cattle as of animals of a race now lost.
In going up the Orinoco, toward San Carlos del Rio Negro, we saw the
last cow at Carichana. The Fathers of the Observance, who now govern
these vast countries, did not immediately succeed the Jesuits. During
an interregnum of eighteen years, the missions were visited only from
time to time, and by Capuchin monks. The agents of the secular
government, under the title of Royal Commissioners, managed the hatos
or farms of the Jesuits with culpable negligence. They killed the
cattle for the sake of selling the hides. Many heifers were devoured
by the jaguars, and a great number perished in consequence of wounds
made by the bats of the raudales, which, though smaller, are far
bolder than the bats of the Llanos. At the time of the expedition of
the boundaries, horses from Encaramada, Carichana, and Atures, were
conveyed as far as San Jose de Maravitanos, where, on the banks of the
Rio Negro, the Portuguese could only procure them, after a long
passage, and of a very inferior quality, by the rivers Amazon and
Grand Para. Since the year 1795, the cattle of the Jesuits have
entirely disappeared. There now remain as monuments of the ancient
cultivation of these countries, and the active industry of the first
missionaries, only a few trunks of the orange and tamarind, in the
savannahs, surrounded by wild trees.
The tigers, or jaguars, which are less dangerous for the cattle than
the bats, come into the village at Atures, and devour the swine of the
poor Indians. The missionary related to us a striking instance of the
familiarity of these animals, usually so ferocious. Some months before
our arrival, a jaguar, which was thought to be young, though of a
large size, had wounded a child in playing with him. The facts of this
case, which were verified to us on the spot, are not without interest
in the history of the manners of animals. Two Indian children, a boy
and a girl, about eight and nine years of age, were seated on the
grass near the village of Atures, in the middle of a savannah, which
we several times traversed. At two o'clock in the afternoon, a jaguar
issued from the forest, and approached the children, bounding around
them; sometimes he hid himself in the high grass, sometimes he sprang
forward, his back bent, his head hung down, in the manner of our cats.
The little boy, ignorant of his danger, seemed to be sensible of it
only when the jaguar with one of his paws gave him some blows on the
head. These blows, at first slight, became ruder and ruder; the claws
of the jaguar wounded the child, and the blood flowed freely. The
little girl then took a branch of a tree, struck the animal, and it
fled from her. The Indians ran up at the cries of the children, and
saw the jaguar, which then bounded off without making the least show
of resistance.
The little boy was brought to us, who appeared lively and intelligent.
The claw of the jaguar had torn away the skin from the lower part of
the forehead, and there was a second scar at the top of the head. This
was a singular fit of playfulness in an animal which, though not
difficult to be tamed in our menageries, nevertheless shows itself
always wild and ferocious in its natural state. If we admit that,
being sure of its prey, it played with the little Indian as our cats
play with birds whose wings have been clipped, how shall we explain
the patience of a jaguar of large size, which finds itself attacked by
a girl? If the jaguar were not pressed by hunger, why did it approach
the children at all? There is something mysterious in the affections
and hatreds of animals.
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