Odd People: Being a Popular Description of Singular Races of Man. Майн Рид

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СКАЧАТЬ in the field. A hundred years will elapse before this grand parterre can be exhausted.

      At present, a thorough examination of the botany of the Amazon valley would be difficult, if not altogether impossible, even though conducted on a grand and expensive scale. There are several reasons for this. Its woods are in many places absolutely impenetrable—on account either of the thick tangled undergrowth, or from the damp, spongy nature of the soil. There are no roads that could be traversed by horse or man; and the few paths are known only to the wild savage,—not always passable even by him. Travelling can only be done by water, either upon the great rivers, or by the narrow creeks (igaripes) or lagoons; and a journey performed in this fashion must needs be both tedious and indirect, allowing but a limited opportunity for observation. Horses can scarce be said to exist in the country, and cattle are equally rare—a few only are found in one or two of the large Portuguese settlements on the main river—and the jaguars and blood-sucking bats offer a direct impediment to their increase. Contrary to the general belief, the tropical forest is not the home of the larger mammalia: it is not their proper habitat, nor are they found in it. In the Amazon forest but few species exist, and these not numerous in individuals. There are no vast herds—as of buffaloes on the prairies of North America, or of antelopes in Africa. The tapir alone attains to any considerable size,—exceeding that of the ass,—but its numbers are few. Three or four species of small deer represent the ruminants, and the hog of the Amazon is the peccary. Of these there are at least three species. Where the forest impinges on the mountain regions of Peru, bears are found of at least two kinds, but not on the lower plains of the great “Montaña,”—for by this general designation is the vast expanse of the Amazon country known among the Peruvian people. “Montes” and “montañas,” literally signifying “mountains,” are not so understood among Spanish Americans. With them the “montes” and “montanas” are tracts of forest-covered country, and that of the Amazon valley is the “Montana” par excellence.

      Sloths of several species, and opossums of still greater variety, are found all over the Montana, but both thinly distributed as regards the number of individuals. A similar remark applies to the ant-eaters or “ant-bears,” of which there are four kinds,—to the armadillos, the “agoutis,” and the “cavies,” one of which last, the capibara, is the largest rodent upon earth. This, with its kindred genus, the “paca,” is not so rare in individual numbers, but, on the contrary, appears in large herds upon the borders of the rivers and lagoons. A porcupine, several species of spinous rats, an otter, two or three kinds of badger-like animals (the potto and coatis), a “honey-bear” (Galera barbara), and a fox, or wild dog, are widely distributed throughout the Montana.

      Everywhere exists the jaguar, both the black and spotted varieties, and the puma has there his lurking-place. Smaller cats, both spotted and striped, are numerous in species, and squirrels of several kinds, with bats, complete the list of the terrestrial mammalia.

      Of all the lower animals, monkeys are the most common, for to them the Montana is a congenial home. They abound not only in species, but in the number of individuals, and their ubiquitous presence contributes to enliven the woods. At least thirty different kinds of them exist in the Amazon valley, from the “coatas,” and other howlers as large as baboons, to the tiny little “ouistitis” and “säimiris,” not bigger than squirrels or rats.

      While we must admit a paucity in the species of the quadrupeds of the Amazon, the same remark does not apply to the birds. In the ornithological department of natural history, a fulness and richness here exist, perhaps not equalled elsewhere. The most singular and graceful forms, combined with the most brilliant plumage, are everywhere presented to the eye, in the parrots and great macaws, the toucans, trogons, and tanagers, the shrikes, humming-birds, and orioles; and even in the vultures and eagles: for here are found the most beautiful of predatory birds,—the king vulture and the harpy eagle. Of the feathered creatures existing in the valleys of the Amazon there are not less than one thousand different species, of which only one half have yet been caught or described.

      Reptiles are equally abundant—the serpent family being represented by numerous species, from the great water boa (anaconda), of ten yards in length, to the tiny and beautiful but venomous lachesis, or coral snake, not thicker than the shank of a tobacco-pipe. The lizards range through a like gradation, beginning with the huge “jacare,” or crocodile, of several species, and ending with the turquoise-blue anolius, not bigger than a newt.

      The waters too are rich in species of their peculiar inhabitants—of which the most remarkable and valuable are the manatees (two or three species), the great and smaller turtles, the porpoises of various kinds, and an endless catalogue of the finny tribes that frequent the rivers of the tropics. It is mainly from this source, and not from four-footed creatures of the forest, that the human denizen of the great Montana draws his supply of food,—at least that portion of it which may be termed the “meaty.” Were it not for the manatee, the great porpoise, and other large fish, he would often have to “eat his bread dry.”

      And now it is his turn to be “talked about.” I need not inform you that the aborigines who inhabit the valley of the Amazon, are all of the so-called Indian race—though there are so many, distinct tribes of them that almost every river of any considerable magnitude has a tribe of its own. In some cases a number of these tribes belong to one nationality; that is, several of them may be found speaking nearly the same language, though living apart from each other; and of these larger divisions or nationalities there are several occupying the different districts of the Montana. The tribes even of the same nationality do not always present a uniform appearance. There are darker and fairer tribes; some in which the average standard of height is less than among Europeans; and others where it equals or exceeds this. There are tribes again where both men and women are ill-shaped and ill-favoured—though these are few—and other tribes where both sexes exhibit a considerable degree of personal beauty. Some tribes are even distinguished for their good looks, the men presenting models of manly form, while the women are equally attractive by the regularity of their features, and the graceful modesty of expression that adorns them.

      A minute detail of the many peculiarities in which the numerous tribes of the Amazon differ from one another would fill a large volume; and in a sketch like the present, which is meant to include them all, it would not be possible to give such a detail. Nor indeed would it serve any good purpose; for although there are many points of difference between the different tribes, yet these are generally of slight importance, and are far more than counterbalanced by the multitude of resemblances. So numerous are these last, as to create a strong idiosyncrasy in the tribes of the Amazon, which not only entitles them to be classed together in an ethnological point of view, but which separates them from all the other Indians of America. Of course, the non-possession of the horse—they do not even know the animal—at once broadly distinguishes them from the Horse Indians, both of the Northern and Southern divisions of the continent.

      It would be idle here to discuss the question as to whether the Amazonian Indians have all a common origin. It is evident they have not. We know that many of them are from Peru and Bogota—runaways from Spanish oppression. We know that others migrated from the south—equally fugitives from the still more brutal and barbarous domination of the Portuguese. And still others were true aboriginals of the soil, or if emigrants, when and whence came they? An idle question, never to be satisfactorily answered. There they now are, and as they are only shall we here consider them.

      Notwithstanding the different sources whence they sprang, we find them, as I have already said, stamped with a certain idiosyncrasy, the result, no doubt, of the like circumstances which surround them. One or two tribes alone, whose habits are somewhat “odder” than the rest, have been treated to a separate chapter; but for the others, whatever is said of one, will, with very slight alteration, stand good for the whole of the Amazonian tribes. Let it be understood that we are discoursing only of those known as the “Indios bravos,” the fierce, brave, savage, or wild СКАЧАТЬ