I
Unhesitatingly Answer Yes, As I Have Had Abundant Opportunity Of
Seeing.
They will strut with peacock pride when wearing a specially
gaudy-colored headdress, although that may be their only article of
attire.
Having on board far more salt than we ourselves needed, I was enabled
to generously distribute much of that invaluable commodity among
them. That also, working in a different way, might be a means of
restoring them to a normal soundness of mind after we left.
Poor lost creatures! For this draught of the white man's poison, far
more terrible to them than the deadly nightshade of their forests,
more dangerous than the venom of the loathsome serpent gliding across
their path, they are willing to sell body or soul. Soul, did I say?
They have never heard of that. To them, so far as I could ascertain,
a future life is unknown. The explorer has penetrated some little way
into their dark forests in search of rubber, or anything else which
it would pay to exploit, but the missionary of the Cross has never
sought to illumine their darker minds. They live their little day and
go out into the unknown unconscious of the fact that One called
Jesus, who was the Incarnate God, died to redeem them. As a
traveller, I have often wondered why men should be willing to pay me
hundreds of dollars to explore those regions for ultimate worldly
gain, and none should ever offer to employ me in proclaiming the
greatest wonder of all the ages - the story of Calvary - for eternal
gain. After all, are the Indians more blind to the future than we
are? Yet, strange to say, we profess to believe in the teachings of
that One who inculcated the practice of laying up treasure in heaven,
while they have not even heard His name. For love of gain men have
been willing to accompany me through the most deadly fever-breeding
morass, or to brave the poisoned arrows of the lynx-eyed Indian, but
few have ever offered to go and tell of Him whom they profess to
serve.
The suffocating atmosphere quite precluded the idea of writing, for a
pen, dipped in ink, would dry before reaching the paper, and the
latter be saturated with perspiration in a few seconds; so these
observations were penned later. So far as I could ascertain, the
Romish Church has never touched the Guatos, and, notwithstanding all
I have said about them, I unhesitatingly affirm that it is better so.
Geo. R. Witte, missionary to Brazil, says: "With one exception, all
the priests with whom I came in contact (when on a journey through
Northern Brazil) were immoral, drunken, and ignorant. The tribes who
have come under priestly care are decidedly inferior in morals,
industry, and order to the tribes who refuse to have anything to do
with the whites. The Charentes and Apinages have been, for years,
under the care of Catholic friars - this is the way I found them: both
men and women walk about naked."
"We heard not one contradiction of the general testimony that the
people who were not under the influence of the Roman Catholic Church
as it is in S. America were better morally than those who were."
[Footnote: Robert E. Speer, "Missions in South America."]
In Christendom organs peal out the anthems of Divine love, and well-
dressed worshippers chant in harmonious unison, "Lord, incline our
hearts to keep Thy law." That law says: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself." To the question: "Who is my neighbor?" the Divine voice
answers: "A certain man." May he not be one of these neglected
Indians?
CHAPTER VI.
ARRIVAL AT THE LAKE.
"It sleeps among a hundred hills
Where no man ever trod,
And only Nature's music fills
The silences of God."
After going about two thousand three hundred miles up this serpentine
river, we discovered the entrance to the lake. Many had been the
conjectures and counsels of would-be advisers when we started. Some
said that there was no entrance to the lake from the river; others,
that there was not sufficient depth of water for the steamer to pass
through. On our port bow rose frowning rocks of forbidding aspect.
Drawing nearer, we noticed, with mingled feelings of curiosity and
wonder, that the face of these rocks was rudely carved by unmistakably
Indian art. There were portrayed a rising sun, tigers' feet, birds'
feet, etc. Why were they thus carved? Are those rocks the everlasting
recorders of some old history - some deed of Indian daring in days of
old? What these hieroglyphics signify we may never know; the workman
is gone, and his stone hammer is buried with him. To twentieth century
civilization his carving tells nothing. No Indians inhabit the shores
of the lake now, perhaps because of this "writing on the wall."
With the leadsman in his place we slowly and cautiously entered the
unexplored lake, and thus for the first time in the world's history
its waters were ploughed by a steamer's keel.
Soon after our arrival the different guards were told off for the
silent watches. Night shut in upon the lake, and all nature slept.
The only lights on shore were those of the fire-flies as they danced
through the myrtle boughs. The stars in the heavens twinkled above
us. Now and again an alligator thrust his huge, ugly nose out of the
water and yawned, thus disturbing for the moment its placid surface,
which the pale moon illuminated with an ethereal light; otherwise
stillness reigned, or, rather, a calm mysterious peace which was deep
and profound. Somehow, the feeling crept upon us that we had become
detached from the world, though yet we lived. Afterwards, when the
tigers [Footnote: Jaguars are invariably called tigers in South
America.] on shore had scented our presence, sleep was often broken
by angry roars coming from the beach, near which we lay at anchor;
but before dawn our noisy visitors always departed, leaving only
their footprints.
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