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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A Missionary Of The Cassiquiare
Conceived Serious Alarms Respecting The Issue Of This Affair; He
Dreaded Being Sent A Prisoner To Cadiz, Or, As They Say In The
Colonies, Having His Name On The List (Baxo Partido De Registro).
Fear
overcame his resolution, and he suddenly disappeared.
Indians were
placed on the watch at the mouth of the Atabapo, at the Great
Cataracts, and wherever the fugitive was likely to pass on his way to
the Lower Orinoco. Notwithstanding these precautions, he arrived at
Angostura, and then reached the college of the missions of Piritu,
denounced his colleagues, and was appointed, in recompense of this
information, to arrest those with whom he had conspired against the
president of the missions.* (* Two of the missionaries, considered as
the leaders of the insurrection, were embarked at Angostura, in order
to be tried in Spain. The vessel in which they were conveyed became
leaky, and put into Spanish Harbour in the island of Trinidad. The
governor Chacon intereated himself in the fate of the monks; they were
pardoned a violent proceeding somewhat inconsistent with monastic
discipline, and were again employed in the missions. I was acquainted
with them both during my abode in South America.) At Esmeralda, where
the political events that have agitated Europe for thirty years past
have not yet been heard of, lively interest is still felt in an event
which is called the sedition of the monks, (el alboroto de los
frailes.) In this country, as in the East, no conception is formed of
any other revolutions than those that are made by rulers themselves;
and we have just seen that the effects are not very alarming.
If the villa of Esmeralda, with a population of twelve or fifteen
families, be at present considered as a frightful place of abode, this
must be attributed to the want of cultivation, the distance from every
other inhabited country, and the excessive quantity of mosquitos. The
site of the mission is highly picturesque; the surrounding country is
lovely, and of great fertility. I never saw plantains of so large a
size as these: and indigo, sugar, and cacao might be produced in
abundance, if any trouble were taken for their cultivation. The Cerro
Duida is surrounded with fine pasturage; and if the Observantins of
the college of Piritu partook a little of the industry of the
Catalonian Capuchins settled on the banks of the Carony, numerous
herds would be seen wandering between the Cunucunumo and the Padamo.
At present, not a cow or a horse is to be found; and the inhabitants,
victims of their own indolence, are often reduced to eat the flesh of
alouate monkeys, and flour made from the bones of fish, of which I
shall have occasion to speak hereafter. A little cassava and a few
plantains only are cultivated; and when the fishery is not abundant,
the natives of a country so favoured by nature are exposed to the most
cruel privations.
The pilots of the small number of boats that go from the Rio Negro to
Angostura by the Cassiquiare are afraid to ascend as far as Esmeralda,
and therefore that mission would have been much better placed at the
point of the bifurcation of the Orinoco. It is probable that this vast
country will not always be doomed to the desertion in which it has
hitherto been left, owing to the errors of monkish administration and
the spirit of monopoly that characterises corporations. We may even
predict on what points of the Orinoco industry and commerce will
become most active. In every zone, population is concentred at the
mouth of tributary streams. The Rio Apure, by which the productions of
the provinces of Varinas and Merida are exported, will give great
importance to the little town of Cabruta, which will then be in
rivalship with San Fernando de Apure, where all commerce has hitherto
centred. Higher up, a new settlement will be formed at the confluence
of the Meta, which communicates with New Grenada by the Llanos of
Casanare. The two missions of the Cataracts will increase, from the
activity to which the transport of boats at those points will give
rise; for an unhealthy and damp climate, and the swarming of
mosquitos, will as little impede the progress of cultivation at the
Orinoco as at the Rio Magdalena, whenever a powerful mercantile
interest shall call new settlers thither. Habitual evils are those
which are least felt; and men born in America do not suffer the same
intensity of pain as Europeans recently arrived. Perhaps, also, the
destruction of forests round the inhabited places, although slow, will
somewhat tend to diminish the torment of the tipulary insects. San
Fernando de Atabapo, Javita, San Carlos, and Esmeralda, appear (from
their situation at the mouth of the Guaviare, the portage between
Tuamini and the Rio Negro, the confluence of the Cassiquiare, and the
point of bifurcation of the Upper Orinoco) to promise a considerable
increase of population and prosperity. The same improvement will take
place in the fertile but uncultivated countries through which flow the
Guallaga, the Amazon, and the Orinoco; as well as at the isthmus of
Panama, the lake of Nicaragua, and the Rio Huasacualco, which furnish
a communication between the two oceans. The imperfection of political
institutions may for ages have converted into deserts places where the
commerce of the world should be found concentred; but the time
approaches when these obstacles shall exist no longer. A vicious
administration cannot always struggle against the united interest of
men; and civilization will be carried insensibly into those countries,
the great destinies of which nature itself proclaims, by the physical
configuration of the soil, the immense windings of the rivers, and the
proximity of two seas, that bathe the shores of Europe and of India.
Esmeralda is the most celebrated spot on the Orinoco for the
preparation of that active poison, which is employed in war, in the
chase, and, singularly enough, as a remedy for gastric derangements.
The poison of the ticunas of the Amazon, the upas-tieute of Java, and
the curare of Guiana, are the most deleterious substances that are
known.
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