Chapter: Now that we are cool, he said, and regret that we hurt each other, I am
not sorry that it happened. I deserved your reproach: a hundred times
I have wished to tell you the whole story of my travels and adventures
among the savages, and one of the reasons which prevented me was the
fear that it would have an unfortunate effect on our friendship. That
was precious, and I desired above everything to keep it. But I must
think no more about that now. I must think only of how I am to tell you
my story. I will begin at a time when I was twenty-three. It was early
in life to be in the thick of politics, and in trouble to the extent of
having to fly my country to save my liberty, perhaps my life.

Every nation, someone remarks, has the government it deserves, and
Venezuela certainly has the one it deserves and that suits it best. We
call it a republic, not only because it is not one, but also because a
thing must have a name; and to have a good name, or a fine name, is
very convenient--especially when you want to borrow money. If the
Venezuelans, thinly distributed over an area of half a million square
miles, mostly illiterate peasants, half-breeds, and indigenes, were
educated, intelligent men, zealous only for the public weal, it would
be possible for them to have a real republic. They have instead
a government by cliques, tempered by revolution; and a very good
government it is, in harmony with the physical conditions of the country
and the national temperament. Now, it happens that the educated men,
representing your higher classes, are so few that there are not many
persons unconnected by ties of blood or marriage with prominent members
of the political groups to which they belong. By this you will see how
easy and almost inevitable it is that we should become accustomed to
look on conspiracy and revolt against the regnant party--the men of
another clique--as only in the natural order of things. In the event
of failure such outbreaks are punished, but they are not regarded as
immoral. On the contrary, men of the highest intelligence and virtue
among us are seen taking a leading part in these adventures. Whether
such a condition of things is intrinsically wrong or not, or would be
wrong in some circumstances and is not wrong, because inevitable, in
others, I cannot pretend to decide; and all this tiresome profusion
is only to enable you to understand how I--a young man of unblemished
character, not a soldier by profession, not ambitious of political
distinction, wealthy for that country, popular in society, a lover of
social pleasures, of books, of nature actuated, as I believed, by the
highest motives, allowed myself to be drawn very readily by friends and
relations into a conspiracy to overthrow the government of the moment,
with the object of replacing it by more worthy men--ourselves, to wit.

Our adventure failed because the authorities got wind of the affair
and matters were precipitated. Our leaders at the moment happened to be
scattered over the country--some were abroad; and a few hotheaded men
of the party, who were in Caracas just then and probably feared arrest,
struck a rash blow: the President was attacked in the street and
wounded. But the attackers were seized, and some of them shot on the
following day. When the news reached me I was at a distance from the
capital, staying with a friend on an estate he owned on the River
Quebrada Honda, in the State of Guarico, some fifteen to twenty miles
from the town of Zaraza. My friend, an officer in the army, was a leader
in the conspiracy; and as I was the only son of a man who had been
greatly hated by the Minister of War, it became necessary for us both
to fly for our lives. In the circumstances we could not look to be
pardoned, even on the score of youth.

Our first decision was to escape to the sea-coast; but as the risk of a
journey to La Guayra, or any other port of embarkation on the north
side of the country, seemed too great, we made our way in a contrary
direction to the Orinoco, and downstream to Angostura. Now, when we had
reached this comparatively safe breathing-place--safe, at all events,
for the moment--I changed my mind about leaving or attempting to leave
the country. Since boyhood I had taken a very peculiar interest in that
vast and almost unexplored territory we possess south of the Orinoco,
with its countless unmapped rivers and trackless forests; and in
its savage inhabitants, with their ancient customs and character,
unadulterated by contact with Europeans. To visit this primitive
wilderness had been a cherished dream; and I had to some extent even
prepared myself for such an adventure by mastering more than one of the
Indian dialects of the northern states of Venezuela. And now, finding
myself on the south side of our great river, with unlimited time at
my disposal, I determined to gratify this wish. My companion took his
departure towards the coast, while I set about making preparations and
hunting up information from those who had travelled in the interior to
trade with the savages. I decided eventually to go back upstream and
penetrate to the interior in the western part of Guayana, and the
Amazonian territory bordering on Colombia and Brazil, and to return to
Angostura in about six months' time. I had no fear of being arrested
in the semi-independent and in most part savage region, as the Guayana
authorities concerned themselves little enough about the political
upheavals at Caracas.

The first five or six months I spent in Guayana, after leaving the city
of refuge, were eventful enough to satisfy a moderately adventurous
spirit. A complaisant government employee at Angostura had provided
me with a passport, in which it was set down (for few to read) that my
object in visiting the interior was to collect information concerning
the native tribes, the vegetable products of the country, and other
knowledge which would be of advantage to the Republic; and the
authorities were requested to afford me protection and assist me in my
pursuits. I ascended the Orinoco, making occasional expeditions to the
small Christian settlements in the neighbourhood of the right bank, also
to the Indian villages; and travelling in this way, seeing and learning
much, in about three months I reached the River Metal. During this
period I amused myself by keeping a journal, a record of personal
adventures, impressions of the country and people, both semi-civilized
and savage; and as my journal grew, I began to think that on my return
at some future time to Caracas, it might prove useful and interesting to
the public, and also procure me fame; which thought proved pleasurable
and a great incentive, so that I began to observe things more narrowly
and to study expression. But the book was not to be.

From the mouth of the Meta I journeyed on, intending to visit the
settlement of Atahapo, where the great River Guaviare, with other
rivers, empties itself into the Orinoco. But I was not destined to reach
it, for at the small settlement of Manapuri I fell ill of a low fever;
and here ended the first half-year of my wanderings, about which no more
need be told.

A more miserable place than Manapuri for a man to be ill of a low fever
in could not well be imagined. The settlement, composed of mean hovels,
with a few large structures of mud, or plastered wattle, thatched
with palm leaves, was surrounded by water, marsh, and forest, the
breeding-place of myriads of croaking frogs and of clouds of mosquitoes;
even to one in perfect health existence in such a place would have
been a burden. The inhabitants mustered about eighty or ninety, mostly
Indians of that degenerate class frequently to be met with in small
trading outposts. The savages of Guayana are great drinkers, but not
drunkards in our sense, since their fermented liquors contain so
little alcohol that inordinate quantities must be swallowed to produce
intoxication; in the settlements they prefer the white man's more potent
poisons, with the result that in a small place like Manapuri one can see
enacted, as on a stage, the last act in the great American tragedy. To
be succeeded, doubtless, by other and possibly greater tragedies. My
thoughts at that period of suffering were pessimistic in the extreme.
Sometimes, when the almost continuous rain held up for half a day, I
would manage to creep out a short distance; but I was almost past making
any exertion, scarcely caring to live, and taking absolutely no interest
in the news from Caracas, which reached me at long intervals. At the end
of two months, feeling a slight improvement in my health, and with it a
returning interest in life and its affairs, it occurred to me to get
out my diary and write a brief account of my sojourn at Manapuri. I had
placed it for safety in a small deal box, lent to me for the purpose
by a Venezuelan trader, an old resident at the settlement, by name
Pantaleon--called by all Don Panta--one who openly kept half a dozen
Indian wives in his house, and was noted for his dishonesty and greed,
but who had proved himself a good friend to me. The box was in a corner
of the wretched palm-thatched hovel I inhabited; but on taking it out I
discovered that for several weeks the rain had been dripping on it, and
that the manuscript was reduced to a sodden pulp. I flung it upon the
floor with a curse and threw myself back on my bed with a groan.

In that desponding state I was found by my friend Panta, who was
constant in his visits at all hours; and when in answer to his anxious
inquiries I pointed to the pulpy mass on the mud floor, he turned it
over with his foot, and then, bursting into a loud laugh, kicked it out,
remarking that he had mistaken the object for some unknown reptile that
had crawled in out of the rain. He affected to be astonished that I
should regret its loss. It was all a true narrative, he exclaimed; if
I wished to write a book for the stay-at-homes to read, I could easily
invent a thousand lies far more entertaining than any real experiences.
He had come to me, he said, to propose something. He had lived twenty
years at that place, and had got accustomed to the climate, but it would
not do for me to remain any longer if I wished to live. I must go away
at once to a different country--to the mountains, where it was open and
dry. "And if you want quinine when you are there," he concluded, "smell
the wind when it blows from the south-west, and you will inhale it into
your system, fresh from the forest." When I remarked despondingly that
in my condition it would be impossible to quit Manapuri, he went on to
say that a small party of Indians was now in the settlement; that they
had come, not only to trade, but to visit one of their own tribe, who
was his wife, purchased some years ago from her father. "And the money
she cost me I have never regretted to this day," said he, "for she is a
good wife not jealous," he added, with a curse on all the others. These
Indians came all the way from the Queneveta mountains, and were of the
Maquiritari tribe. He, Panta, and, better still, his good wife would
interest them on my behalf, and for a suitable reward they would take me
by slow, easy stages to their own country, where I would be treated well
and recover my health.

This proposal, after I had considered it well, produced so good an
effect on me that I not only gave a glad consent, but, on the following
day, I was able to get about and begin the preparations for my journey
with some spirit.

In about eight days I bade good-bye to my generous friend Panta, whom I
regarded, after having seen much of him, as a kind of savage beast that
had sprung on me, not to rend, but to rescue from death; for we
know that even cruel savage brutes and evil men have at times sweet,
beneficent impulses, during which they act in a way contrary to their
natures, like passive agents of some higher power. It was a continual
pain to travel in my weak condition, and the patience of my Indians
was severely taxed; but they did not forsake me; and at last the entire
distance, which I conjectured to be about sixty-five leagues, was
accomplished; and at the end I was actually stronger and better in
every way than at the start. From this time my progress towards complete
recovery was rapid. The air, with or without any medicinal virtue blown
from the cinchona trees in the far-off Andean forest, was tonic; and
when I took my walks on the hillside above the Indian village, or later
when able to climb to the summits, the world as seen from those
wild Queneveta mountains had a largeness and varied glory of scenery
peculiarly refreshing and delightful to the soul.

With the Maquiritari tribe I passed some weeks, and the sweet sensations
of returning health made me happy for a time; but such sensations seldom
outlast convalescence. I was no sooner well again than I began to feel
a restless spirit stirring in me. The monotony of savage life in this
place became intolerable. After my long listless period the reaction had
come, and I wished only for action, adventure--no matter how dangerous;
and for new scenes, new faces, new dialects. In the end I conceived the
idea of going on to the Casiquiare river, where I would find a few small
settlements, and perhaps obtain help from the authorities there which
would enable me to reach the Rio Negro. For it was now in my mind to
follow that river to the Amazons, and so down to Para and the Atlantic
coast.

Leaving the Queneveta range, I started with two of the Indians as guides
and travelling companions; but their journey ended only half-way to the
river I wished to reach; and they left me with some friendly savages
living on the Chunapay, a tributary of the Cunucumana, which flows to
the Orinoco. Here I had no choice but to wait until an opportunity of
attaching myself to some party of travelling Indians going south-west
should arrive; for by this time I had expended the whole of my small
capital in ornaments and calico brought from Manapuri, so that I could
no longer purchase any man's service. And perhaps it will be as well
to state at this point just what I possessed. For some time I had worn
nothing but sandals to protect my feet; my garments consisted of a
single suit, and one flannel shirt, which I washed frequently, going
shirtless while it was drying. Fortunately I had an excellent blue cloth
cloak, durable and handsome, given to me by a friend at Angostura, whose
prophecy on presenting it, that it would outlast ME, very nearly came
true. It served as a covering by night, and to keep a man warm and
comfortable when travelling in cold and wet weather no better garment
was ever made. I had a revolver and metal cartridge-box in my broad
leather belt, also a good hunting-knife with strong buckhorn handle and
a heavy blade about nine inches long. In the pocket of my cloak I had a
pretty silver tinder-box, and a match-box--to be mentioned again in this
narrative--and one or two other trifling objects; these I was determined
to keep until they could be kept no longer.

During the tedious interval of waiting on the Chunapay I was told a
flattering tale by the village Indians, which eventually caused me
to abandon the proposed journey to the Rio Negro. These Indians wore
necklets, like nearly all the Guayana savages; but one, I observed,
possessed a necklet unlike that of the others, which greatly aroused my
curiosity. It was made of thirteen gold plates, irregular in form, about
as broad as a man's thumb-nail, and linked together with fibres. I was
allowed to examine it, and had no doubt that the pieces were of pure
gold, beaten flat by the savages. When questioned about it, they said
it was originally obtained from the Indians of Parahuari, and Parahuari,
they further said, was a mountainous country west of the Orinoco. Every
man and woman in that place, they assured me, had such a necklet. This
report inflamed my mind to such a degree that I could not rest by night
or day for dreaming golden dreams, and considering how to get to that
rich district, unknown to civilized men. The Indians gravely shook their
heads when I tried to persuade them to take me. They were far enough
from the Orinoco, and Parahuari was ten, perhaps fifteen, days' journey
further on--a country unknown to them, where they had no relations.

In spite of difficulties and delays, however, and not without pain and
some perilous adventures, I succeeded at last in reaching the upper
Orinoco, and, eventually, in crossing to the other side. With my life
in my hand I struggled on westward through an unknown difficult country,
from Indian village to village, where at any moment I might have been
murdered with impunity for the sake of my few belongings. It is hard for
me to speak a good word for the Guayana savages; but I must now say this
of them, that they not only did me no harm when I was at their mercy
during this long journey, but they gave me shelter in their villages,
and fed me when I was hungry, and helped me on my way when I could make
no return. You must not, however, run away with the idea that there is
any sweetness in their disposition, any humane or benevolent instincts
such as are found among the civilized nations: far from it. I regard
them now, and, fortunately for me, I regarded them then, when, as I have
said, I was at their mercy, as beasts of prey, plus a cunning or low
kind of intelligence vastly greater than that of the brute; and, for
only morality, that respect for the rights of other members of the same
family, or tribe, without which even the rudest communities cannot hold
together. How, then, could I do this thing, and dwell and travel freely,
without receiving harm, among tribes that have no peace with and no
kindly feelings towards the stranger, in a district where the white
man is rarely or never seen? Because I knew them so well. Without that
knowledge, always available, and an extreme facility in acquiring new
dialects, which had increased by practice until it was almost like
intuition, I should have fared badly after leaving the Maquiritari
tribe. As it was, I had two or three very narrow escapes.

To return from this digression. I looked at last on the famous Parahuari
mountains, which, I was greatly surprised to find, were after all
nothing but hills, and not very high ones. This, however, did not
impress me. The very fact that Parahuari possessed no imposing feature
in its scenery seemed rather to prove that it must be rich in gold: how
else could its name and the fame of its treasures be familiar to people
dwelling so far away as the Cunucumana?

But there was no gold. I searched through the whole range, which was
about seven leagues long, and visited the villages, where I talked much
with the Indians, interrogating them, and they had no necklets of
gold, nor gold in any form; nor had they ever heard of its presence in
Parahuari or in any other place known to them.

The very last village where I spoke on the subject of my quest, albeit
now without hope, was about a league from the western extremity of the
range, in the midst of a high broken country of forest and savannah and
many swift streams; near one of these, called the Curicay, the village
stood, among low scattered trees--a large building, in which all the
people, numbering eighteen, passed most of their time when not hunting,
with two smaller buildings attached to it. The head, or chief, Runi by
name, was about fifty years old, a taciturn, finely formed, and somewhat
dignified savage, who was either of a sullen disposition or not well
pleased at the intrusion of a white man. And for a time I made no
attempt to conciliate him. What profit was there in it at all? Even
that light mask, which I had worn so long and with such good effect,
incommoded me now: I would cast it aside and be myself--silent and
sullen as my barbarous host. If any malignant purpose was taking form
in his mind, let it, and let him do his worst; for when failure first
stares a man in the face, it has so dark and repellent a look that not
anything that can be added can make him more miserable; nor has he any
apprehension. For weeks I had been searching with eager, feverish
eyes in every village, in every rocky crevice, in every noisy mountain
streamlet, for the glittering yellow dust I had travelled so far to
find. And now all my beautiful dreams--all the pleasure and power to
be--had vanished like a mere mirage on the savannah at noon.

It was a day of despair which I spent in this place, sitting all day
indoors, for it was raining hard, immersed in my own gloomy thoughts,
pretending to doze in my seat, and out of the narrow slits of my
half-closed eyes seeing the others, also sitting or moving about, like
shadows or people in a dream; and I cared nothing about them, and wished
not to seem friendly, even for the sake of the food they might offer me
by and by.

Towards evening the rain ceased; and rising up I went out a short
distance to the neighbouring stream, where I sat on a stone and, casting
off my sandals, laved my bruised feet in the cool running water. The
western half of the sky was blue again with that tender lucid blue
seen after rain, but the leaves still glittered with water, and the wet
trunks looked almost black under the green foliage. The rare loveliness
of the scene touched and lightened my heart. Away back in the east
the hills of Parahuari, with the level sun full on them, loomed with a
strange glory against the grey rainy clouds drawing off on that side,
and their new mystic beauty almost made me forget how these same hills
had wearied, and hurt, and mocked me. On that side, also to the north
and south, there was open forest, but to the west a different prospect
met the eye. Beyond the stream and the strip of verdure that fringed it,
and the few scattered dwarf trees growing near its banks, spread a brown
savannah sloping upwards to a long, low, rocky ridge, beyond which rose
a great solitary hill, or rather mountain, conical in form, and clothed
in forest almost to the summit. This was the mountain Ytaioa, the chief
landmark in that district. As the sun went down over the ridge, beyond
the savannah, the whole western sky changed to a delicate rose colour
that had the appearance of rose-coloured smoke blown there by some far
off-wind, and left suspended--a thin, brilliant veil showing through it
the distant sky beyond, blue and ethereal. Flocks of birds, a kind of
troupial, were flying past me overhead, flock succeeding flock, on their
way to their roosting-place, uttering as they flew a clear, bell-like
chirp; and there was something ethereal too in those drops of melodious
sound, which fell into my heart like raindrops falling into a pool to
mix their fresh heavenly water with the water of earth.

Doubtless into the turbid tarn of my heart some sacred drops had
fallen--from the passing birds, from that crimson disk which had now
dropped below the horizon, the darkening hills, the rose and blue of
infinite heaven, from the whole visible circle; and I felt purified
and had a strange sense and apprehension of a secret innocence and
spirituality in nature--a prescience of some bourn, incalculably distant
perhaps, to which we are all moving; of a time when the heavenly rain
shall have washed us clean from all spot and blemish. This unexpected
peace which I had found now seemed to me of infinitely greater value
than that yellow metal I had missed finding, with all its possibilities.
My wish now was to rest for a season at this spot, so remote and lovely
and peaceful, where I had experienced such unusual feelings and such a
blessed disillusionment.

This was the end of my second period in Guayana: the first had been
filled with that dream of a book to win me fame in my country, perhaps
even in Europe; the second, from the time of leaving the Queneveta
mountains, with the dream of boundless wealth--the old dream of gold
in this region that has drawn so many minds since the days of Francisco
Pizarro. But to remain I must propitiate Runi, sitting silent with
gloomy brows over there indoors; and he did not appear to me like one
that might be won with words, however flattering. It was clear to
me that the time had come to part with my one remaining valuable
trinket--the tinder-box of chased silver.

I returned to the house and, going in, seated myself on a log by the
fire, just opposite to my grim host, who was smoking and appeared not
to have moved since I left him. I made myself a cigarette, then drew out
the tinder-box, with its flint and steel attached to it by means of
two small silver chains. His eyes brightened a little as they curiously
watched my movements, and he pointed without speaking to the glowing
coals of fire at my feet. I shook my head, and striking the steel, sent
out a brilliant spray of sparks, then blew on the tinder and lit my
cigarette.

This done, instead of returning the box to my pocket I passed the chain
through the buttonhole of my cloak and let it dangle on my breast as
an ornament. When the cigarette was smoked, I cleared my throat in the
orthodox manner and fixed my eyes on Runi, who, on his part, made a
slight movement to indicate that he was ready to listen to what I had to
say.

My speech was long, lasting at least half an hour, delivered in
a profound silence; it was chiefly occupied with an account of my
wanderings in Guayana; and being little more than a catalogue of names
of all the places I had visited, and the tribes and chief or head men
with whom I had come in contact, I was able to speak continuously, and
so to hide my ignorance of a dialect which was still new to me.
The Guayana savage judges a man for his staying powers. To stand as
motionless as a bronze statue for one or two hours watching for a
bird; to sit or lie still for half a day; to endure pain, not seldom
self-inflicted, without wincing; and when delivering a speech to pour
it out in a copious stream, without pausing to take breath or hesitating
over a word--to be able to do all this is to prove yourself a man, an
equal, one to be respected and even made a friend of. What I really
wished to say to him was put in a few words at the conclusion of my
well-nigh meaningless oration. Everywhere, I said, I had been the
Indian's friend, and I wished to be his friend, to live with him at
Parahuari, even as I had lived with other chiefs and heads of villages
and families; to be looked on by him, as these others had looked on me,
not as a stranger or a white man, but as a friend, a brother, an Indian.

I ceased speaking, and there was a slight murmurous sound in the room,
as of wind long pent up in many lungs suddenly exhaled; while Runi,
still unmoved, emitted a low grunt. Then I rose, and detaching the
silver ornament from my cloak, presented it to him. He accepted it; not
very graciously, as a stranger to these people might have imagined; but
I was satisfied, feeling sure that I had made a favourable impression.
After a little he handed the box to the person sitting next to him, who
examined it and passed it on to a third, and in this way it went round
and came back once more to Runi. Then he called for a drink. There
happened to be a store of casserie in the house; probably the women had
been busy for some days past in making it, little thinking that it was
destined to be prematurely consumed. A large jarful was produced; Runi
politely quaffed the first cup; I followed; then the others; and the
women drank also, a woman taking about one cupful to a man's three.
Runi and I, however, drank the most, for we had our positions as the two
principal personages there to maintain. Tongues were loosened now; for
the alcohol, small as the quantity contained in this mild liquor is, had
begun to tell on our brains. I had not their pottle-shaped stomach, made
to hold unlimited quantities of meat and drink; but I was determined on
this most important occasion not to deserve my host's contempt--to be
compared, perhaps, to the small bird that delicately picks up six drops
of water in its bill and is satisfied. I would measure my strength
against his, and if necessary drink myself into a state of
insensibility.

At last I was scarcely able to stand on my legs. But even the seasoned
old savage was affected by this time. In vino veritas, said the
ancients; and the principle holds good where there is no vinum, but only
mild casserie. Runi now informed me that he had once known a white man,
that he was a bad man, which had caused him to say that all white men
were bad; even as David, still more sweepingly, had proclaimed that all
men were liars. Now he found that it was not so, that I was a good man.
His friendliness increased with intoxication. He presented me with a
curious little tinder-box, made from the conical tail of an armadillo,
hollowed out, and provided with a wooden stopper--this to be used in
place of the box I had deprived myself of. He also furnished me with a
grass hammock, and had it hung up there and then, so that I could lie
down when inclined. There was nothing he would not do for me. And at
last, when many more cups had been emptied, and a third or fourth jar
brought out, he began to unburthen his heart of its dark and dangerous
secrets. He shed tears--for the "man without a tear" dwells not in the
woods of Guayana: tears for those who had been treacherously slain long
years ago; for his father, who had been killed by Tripica, the father
of Managa, who was still above ground. But let him and all his people
beware of Runi. He had spilt their blood before, he had fed the fox and
vulture with their flesh, and would never rest while Managa lived with
his people at Uritay--the five hills of Uritay, which were two days'
journey from Parahuari. While thus talking of his old enemy he lashed
himself into a kind of frenzy, smiting his chest and gnashing his teeth;
and finally seizing a spear, he buried its point deep into the clay
floor, only to wrench it out and strike it into the earth again and
again, to show how he would serve Managa, and any one of Managa's people
he might meet with--man, woman, or child. Then he staggered out from the
door to flourish his spear; and looking to the north-west, he shouted
aloud to Managa to come and slay his people and burn down his house, as
he had so often threatened to do.

"Let him come! Let Managa come!" I cried, staggering out after him. "I
am your friend, your brother; I have no spear and no arrows, but I have
this--this!" And here I drew out and flourished my revolver. "Where is
Managa?" I continued. "Where are the hills of Uritay?" He pointed to
a star low down in the south-west. "Then," I shouted, "let this bullet
find Managa, sitting by the fire among his people, and let him fall and
pour out his blood on the ground!" And with that I discharged my pistol
in the direction he had pointed to. A scream of terror burst out from
the women and children, while Runi at my side, in an access of fierce
delight and admiration, turned and embraced me. It was the first and
last embrace I ever suffered from a naked male savage, and although
this did not seem a time for fastidious feelings, to be hugged to his
sweltering body was an unpleasant experience.

More cups of casserie followed this outburst; and at last, unable to
keep it up any longer, I staggered to my hammock; but being unable to
get into it, Runi, overflowing with kindness, came to my assistance,
whereupon we fell and rolled together on the floor. Finally I was raised
by the others and tumbled into my swinging bed, and fell at once into a
deep, dreamless sleep, from which I did not awake until after sunrise on
the following morning.



It is fortunate that casserie is manufactured by an extremely slow,
laborious process, since the women, who are the drink-makers, in the
first place have to reduce the material (cassava bread) to a pulp by
means of their own molars, after which it is watered down and put away
in troughs to ferment. Great is the diligence of these willing slaves;
but, work how they will, they can only satisfy their lords' love of
a big drink at long intervals. Such a function as that at which I had
assisted is therefore the result of much patient mastication and silent
fermentation--the delicate flower of a plant that has been a long time
growing.

Having now established myself as one of the family, at the cost of some
disagreeable sensations and a pang or two of self-disgust, I resolved
to let nothing further trouble me at Parahuari, but to live the
easy, careless life of the idle man, joining in hunting and fishing
expeditions when in the mood; at other times enjoying existence in my
own way, apart from my fellows, conversing with wild nature in that
solitary place. Besides Runi, there were, in our little community, two
oldish men, his cousins I believe, who had wives and grown-up
children. Another family consisted of Piake, Runi's nephew, his brother
Kua-ko--about whom there will be much to say--and a sister Oalava. Piake
had a wife and two children; Kua-ko was unmarried and about nineteen or
twenty years old; Oalava was the youngest of the three. Last of all,
who should perhaps have been first, was Runi's mother, called Cla-cla,
probably in imitation of the cry of some bird, for in these latitudes a
person is rarely, perhaps never, called by his or her real name, which
is a secret jealously preserved, even from near relations. I believe
that Cla-cla herself was the only living being who knew the name her
parents had bestowed on her at birth. She was a very old woman, spare
in figure, brown as old sun-baked leather, her face written over with
innumerable wrinkles, and her long coarse hair perfectly white; yet she
was exceedingly active, and seemed to do more work than any other woman
in the community; more than that, when the day's toil was over and
nothing remained for the others to do, then Cla-cla's night work would
begin; and this was to talk all the others, or at all events all the
men, to sleep. She was like a self-regulating machine, and punctually
every evening, when the door was closed, and the night fire made up, and
every man in his hammock, she would set herself going, telling the most
interminable stories, until the last listener was fast asleep; later
in the night, if any man woke with a snort or grunt, off she would go
again, taking up the thread of the tale where she had dropped it.

Old Cla-cla amused me very much, by night and day, and I seldom tired of
watching her owlish countenance as she sat by the fire, never allowing
it to sink low for want of fuel; always studying the pot when it was on
to simmer, and at the same time attending to the movements of the others
about her, ready at a moment's notice to give assistance or to dart out
on a stray chicken or refractory child.

So much did she amuse me, although without intending it, that I
thought it would be only fair, in my turn, to do something for her
entertainment. I was engaged one day in shaping a wooden foil with my
knife, whistling and singing snatches of old melodies at my work,
when all at once I caught sight of the ancient dame looking greatly
delighted, chuckling internally, nodding her head, and keeping time
with her hands. Evidently she was able to appreciate a style of music
superior to that of the aboriginals, and forthwith I abandoned my foils
for the time and set about the manufacture of a guitar, which cost
me much labour and brought out more ingenuity than I had ever thought
myself capable of. To reduce the wood to the right thinness, then to
bend and fasten it with wooden pegs and with gums, to add the arm,
frets, keys, and finally the catgut strings--those of another kind being
out of the question--kept me busy for some days. When completed it was
a rude instrument, scarcely tunable; nevertheless when I smote the
strings, playing lively music, or accompanied myself in singing, I found
that it was a great success, and so was as much pleased with my own
performance as if I had had the most perfect guitar ever made in old
Spain. I also skipped about the floor, strum-strumming at the same time,
instructing them in the most lively dances of the whites, in which the
feet must be as nimble as the player's fingers. It is true that these
exhibitions were always witnessed by the adults with a profound gravity,
which would have disheartened a stranger to their ways. They were a set
of hollow bronze statues that looked at me, but I knew that the living
animals inside of them were tickled at my singing, strumming, and
pirouetting. Cla-cla was, however, an exception, and encouraged me not
infrequently by emitting a sound, half cackle and half screech, by
way of laughter; for she had come to her second childhood, or, at all
events, had dropped the stolid mask which the young Guayana savage, in
imitation of his elders, adjusts to his face at about the age of twelve,
to wear it thereafter all his life long, or only to drop it occasionally
when very drunk. The youngsters also openly manifested their pleasure,
although, as a rule, they try to restrain their feelings in the presence
of grown-up people, and with them I became a great favourite.

By and by I returned to my foil-making, and gave them fencing lessons,
and sometimes invited two or three of the biggest boys to attack me
simultaneously, just to show how easily I could disarm and kill them.
This practice excited some interest in Kua-ko, who had a little more of
curiosity and geniality and less of the put-on dignity of the others,
and with him I became most intimate. Fencing with Kua-ko was highly
amusing: no sooner was he in position, foil in hand, than all my
instructions were thrown to the winds, and he would charge and attack me
in his own barbarous manner, with the result that I would send his foil
spinning a dozen yards away, while he, struck motionless, would gaze
after it in open-mouthed astonishment.

Three weeks had passed by not unpleasantly when, one morning, I took
it into my head to walk by myself across that somewhat sterile savannah
west of the village and stream, which ended, as I have said, in a long,
low, stony ridge. From the village there was nothing to attract the
eye in that direction; but I wished to get a better view of that great
solitary hill or mountain of Ytaioa, and of the cloud-like summits
beyond it in the distance. From the stream the ground rose in a gradual
slope, and the highest part of the ridge for which I made was about
two miles from the starting-point--a parched brown plain, with nothing
growing on it but scattered tussocks of sere hair-like grass.

When I reached the top and could see the country beyond, I was agreeably
disappointed at the discovery that the sterile ground extended only
about a mile and a quarter on the further side, and was succeeded by a
forest--a very inviting patch of woodland covering five or six square
miles, occupying a kind of oblong basin, extending from the foot of
Ytaioa on the north to a low range of rocky hills on the south. From the
wooded basin long narrow strips of forest ran out in various directions
like the arms of an octopus, one pair embracing the slopes of Ytaioa,
another much broader belt extending along a valley which cut through the
ridge of hills on the south side at right angles and was lost to sight
beyond; far away in the west and south and north distant mountains
appeared, not in regular ranges, but in groups or singly, or looking
like blue banked-up clouds on the horizon.

Glad at having discovered the existence of this forest so near home, and
wondering why my Indian friends had never taken me to it nor ever went
out on that side, I set forth with a light heart to explore it for
myself, regretting only that I was without a proper weapon for procuring
game. The walk from the ridge over the savannah was easy, as the barren,
stony ground sloped downwards the whole way. The outer part of the wood
on my side was very open, composed in most part of dwarf trees that grow
on stony soil, and scattered thorny bushes bearing a yellow pea-shaped
blossom. Presently I came to thicker wood, where the trees were much
taller and in greater variety; and after this came another sterile
strip, like that on the edge of the wood where stone cropped out from
the ground and nothing grew except the yellow-flowered thorn bushes.
Passing this sterile ribbon, which seemed to extend to a considerable
distance north and south, and was fifty to a hundred yards wide, the
forest again became dense and the trees large, with much undergrowth in
places obstructing the view and making progress difficult.

I spent several hours in this wild paradise, which was so much more
delightful than the extensive gloomier forests I had so often penetrated
in Guayana; for here, if the trees did not attain to such majestic
proportions, the variety of vegetable forms was even greater; as far
as I went it was nowhere dark under the trees, and the number of lovely
parasites everywhere illustrated the kindly influence of light and air.
Even where the trees were largest the sunshine penetrated, subdued by
the foliage to exquisite greenish-golden tints, filling the wide lower
spaces with tender half-lights, and faint blue-and-gray shadows. Lying
on my back and gazing up, I felt reluctant to rise and renew my ramble.
For what a roof was that above my head! Roof I call it, just as the
poets in their poverty sometimes describe the infinite ethereal sky by
that word; but it was no more roof-like and hindering to the soaring
spirit than the higher clouds that float in changing forms and tints,
and like the foliage chasten the intolerable noonday beams. How far
above me seemed that leafy cloudland into which I gazed! Nature, we
know, first taught the architect to produce by long colonnades the
illusion of distance; but the light-excluding roof prevents him from
getting the same effect above. Here Nature is unapproachable with her
green, airy canopy, a sun-impregnated cloud--cloud above cloud; and
though the highest may be unreached by the eye, the beams yet filter
through, illuming the wide spaces beneath--chamber succeeded by chamber,
each with its own special lights and shadows. Far above me, but not
nearly so far as it seemed, the tender gloom of one such chamber or
space is traversed now by a golden shaft of light falling through some
break in the upper foliage, giving a strange glory to everything it
touches--projecting leaves, and beard-like tuft of moss, and snaky
bush-rope. And in the most open part of that most open space, suspended
on nothing to the eye, the shaft reveals a tangle of shining silver
threads--the web of some large tree-spider. These seemingly distant yet
distinctly visible threads serve to remind me that the human artist is
only able to get his horizontal distance by a monotonous reduplication
of pillar and arch, placed at regular intervals, and that the least
departure from this order would destroy the effect. But Nature produces
her effects at random, and seems only to increase the beautiful illusion
by that infinite variety of decoration in which she revels, binding tree
to tree in a tangle of anaconda-like lianas, and dwindling down from
these huge cables to airy webs and hair-like fibres that vibrate to the
wind of the passing insect's wing.

Thus in idleness, with such thoughts for company, I spent my time, glad
that no human being, savage or civilized, was with me. It was better to
be alone to listen to the monkeys that chattered without offending; to
watch them occupied with the unserious business of their lives. With
that luxuriant tropical nature, its green clouds and illusive aerial
spaces, full of mystery, they harmonized well in language, appearance,
and motions--mountebank angels, living their fantastic lives far above
earth in a half-way heaven of their own.

I saw more monkeys on that morning than I usually saw in the course of
a week's rambling. And other animals were seen; I particularly remember
two accouries I startled, that after rushing away a few yards stopped
and stood peering back at me as if not knowing whether to regard me as
friend or enemy. Birds, too, were strangely abundant; and altogether
this struck me as being the richest hunting-ground I had seen, and it
astonished me to think that the Indians of the village did not appear to
visit it.

On my return in the afternoon I gave an enthusiastic account of my day's
ramble, speaking not of the things that had moved my soul, but only of
those which move the Guayana Indian's soul--the animal food he craves,
and which, one would imagine, Nature would prefer him to do without, so
hard he finds it to wrest a sufficiency from her. To my surprise they
shook their heads and looked troubled at what I said; and finally my
host informed me that the wood I had been in was a dangerous place; that
if they went there to hunt, a great injury would be done to them; and he
finished by advising me not to visit it again.

I began to understand from their looks and the old man's vague words
that their fear of the wood was superstitious. If dangerous creatures
had existed there--tigers, or camoodis, or solitary murderous
savages--they would have said so; but when I pressed them with questions
they could only repeat that "something bad" existed in the place, that
animals were abundant there because no Indian who valued his life dared
venture into it. I replied that unless they gave me some more definite
information I should certainly go again and put myself in the way of the
danger they feared.

My reckless courage, as they considered it, surprised them; but they had
already begun to find out that their superstitions had no effect on me,
that I listened to them as to stories invented to amuse a child, and for
the moment they made no further attempt to dissuade me.

Next day I returned to the forest of evil report, which had now a
new and even greater charm--the fascination of the unknown and the
mysterious; still, the warning I had received made me distrustful and
cautious at first, for I could not help thinking about it. When we
consider how much of their life is passed in the woods, which become
as familiar to them as the streets of our native town to us, it seems
almost incredible that these savages have a superstitious fear of all
forests, fearing them as much, even in the bright light of day, as a
nervous child with memory filled with ghost-stories fears a dark room.
But, like the child in the dark room, they fear the forest only when
alone in it, and for this reason always hunt in couples or parties.
What, then, prevented them from visiting this particular wood, which
offered so tempting a harvest? The question troubled me not a little; at
the same time I was ashamed of the feeling, and fought against it; and
in the end I made my way to the same sequestered spot where I had rested
so long on my previous visit.

In this place I witnessed a new thing and had a strange experience.
Sitting on the ground in the shade of a large tree, I began to hear a
confused noise as of a coming tempest of wind mixed with shrill calls
and cries. Nearer and nearer it came, and at last a multitude of birds
of many kinds, but mostly small, appeared in sight swarming through the
trees, some running on the trunks and larger branches, others flitting
through the foliage, and many keeping on the wing, now hovering and
now darting this way or that. They were all busily searching for and
pursuing the insects, moving on at the same time, and in a very few
minutes they had finished examining the trees near me and were gone; but
not satisfied with what I had witnessed, I jumped up and rushed after
the flock to keep it in sight. All my caution and all recollection of
what the Indians had said was now forgot, so great was my interest in
this bird-army; but as they moved on without pause, they quickly left me
behind, and presently my career was stopped by an impenetrable tangle of
bushes, vines, and roots of large trees extending like huge cables
along the ground. In the midst of this leafy labyrinth I sat down on a
projecting root to cool my blood before attempting to make my way back
to my former position. After that tempest of motion and confused noises
the silence of the forest seemed very profound; but before I had
been resting many moments it was broken by a low strain of exquisite
bird-melody, wonderfully pure and expressive, unlike any musical sound I
had ever heard before. It seemed to issue from a thick cluster of broad
leaves of a creeper only a few yards from where I sat. With my eyes
fixed on this green hiding-place I waited with suspended breath for its
repetition, wondering whether any civilized being had ever listened to
such a strain before. Surely not, I thought, else the fame of so divine
a melody would long ago have been noised abroad. I thought of the
rialejo, the celebrated organbird or flute-bird, and of the various ways
in which hearers are affected by it. To some its warbling is like the
sound of a beautiful mysterious instrument, while to others it seems
like the singing of a blithe-hearted child with a highly melodious
voice. I had often heard and listened with delight to the singing of the
rialejo in the Guayana forests, but this song, or musical phrase, was
utterly unlike it in character. It was pure, more expressive, softer--so
low that at a distance of forty yards I could hardly have heard it.
But its greatest charm was its resemblance to the human voice--a voice
purified and brightened to something almost angelic. Imagine, then, my
impatience as I sat there straining my sense, my deep disappointment
when it was not repeated! I rose at length very reluctantly and slowly
began making my way back; but when I had progressed about thirty yards,
again the sweet voice sounded just behind me, and turning quickly, I
stood still and waited. The same voice, but not the same song--not
the same phrase; the notes were different, more varied and rapidly
enunciated, as if the singer had been more excited. The blood rushed to
my heart as I listened; my nerves tingled with a strange new delight,
the rapture produced by such music heightened by a sense of mystery.
Before many moments I heard it again, not rapid now, but a soft
warbling, lower than at first, infinitely sweet and tender, sinking to
lisping sounds that soon ceased to be audible; the whole having lasted
as long as it would take me to repeat a sentence of a dozen words. This
seemed the singer's farewell to me, for I waited and listened in vain to
hear it repeated; and after getting back to the starting-point I sat for
upwards of an hour, still hoping to hear it once more!

The weltering sun at length compelled me to quit the wood, but not
before I had resolved to return the next morning and seek for the spot
where I had met with so enchanting an experience. After crossing the
sterile belt I have mentioned within the wood, and just before I came to
the open outer edge where the stunted trees and bushes die away on the
border of the savannah, what was my delight and astonishment at hearing
the mysterious melody once more! It seemed to issue from a clump of
bushes close by; but by this time I had come to the conclusion
that there was a ventriloquism in this woodland voice which made it
impossible for me to determine its exact direction. Of one thing I was,
however, now quite convinced, and that was that the singer had been
following me all the time. Again and again as I stood there listening it
sounded, now so faint and apparently far off as to be scarcely audible;
then all at once it would ring out bright and clear within a few yards
of me, as if the shy little thing had suddenly grown bold; but, far or
near, the vocalist remained invisible, and at length the tantalizing
melody ceased altogether.

 Abel starts the story of his travels and adventures when, at the age of twenty-three, he takes part in an unsuccessful plot against the corrupt Venezuelan government. Instead of going into exile abroad, Abel decides to satisfy a boyhood ambition by exploring the interior of his country, south of the Orinoco river. The young man, well prepared for the dangerous excursion because of his mastery of several Indian dialects, penetrates deep into the jungles and visits isolated communities. Don Panta, an old Venezuelan trader, befriends Abel and teaches him some valuable lessons about survival in the dense forests. Rumors about gold spur Abel to undertake further explorations, and he reaches the Parahuari mountains, where his search for gold proves futile. Arriving at an Indian village, Abel is greeted sullenly by Runi, the chief, because he had suffered at the hands of the one white man whom he once met. After drinking casserie, an Indian "home brew," with his hosts, Abel makes a favorable impression on the Indians by his promise to help them defeat another tribe in battle. The Parahuari Indians, also under the influence of casserie, allow Abel to rest and to enjoy their hospitality for three weeks. During that period of idle time, Abel tries to make the acquaintance of these Indians and to understand their psychology and way of life. Unable to sympathize generally with their savage natures, Abel nevertheless enjoys the story-telling of Cla-cla, Runi's mother, and the fencing lessons he starts with Kuako, a young brave about nineteen or twenty years old. Restless and tired of the monotonous existence of the Parahuari village, Abel goes one day into the forest in order to get a better view of the solitary mountain of Ytaioa. When he returns, his host warns Abel not to visit the forest anymore because "something bad" will happen to the person who trespasses in the forest. Although Abel is impressed by the fact that these Indians never go near "this wild paradise," he is personally encouraged rather than disheartened by the challenge of the jungle mystery. On the following day, Abel sets out for "the forest of evil report" because he is completely charmed by "the fascination of the unknown and the mysterious." Wandering through the "green mansions" of trees, Abel is entranced by the melodious strains of one particular bird because of its resemblance to the human voice. Abel, in fact, is almost convinced that a "being" is the source of the delightful song; he is determined to keep on returning to the woodland until he solves the mystery.

