Across Unknown South America

by Arnold Henry Savage Landor

The soil at the bottom of the valley (1,500 ft. above sea level) was mostly composed of cinders, but up the slopes white sand was predominant, mixed with ashes. We travelled over a lava flow which formed the bed of the River Macucu, flowing eastward. Guided by the noise, we found a most beautiful waterfall, 100 ft. high, over an extinct circular crater with vertical walls. We kept on rising over a gentle incline, and having reached an elevation of 1,750 ft. we found ourselves suddenly on the upper edge of a great crescent-shaped depression extending in a semicircle from north-east to south-west. Its walls were one-tiered to the west, with a flat table-land on their summit, but were divided into two terraces in the northern part where ranges of hills rose on the plateau.

We had a rapid, steep descent among great rectangular blocks of conglomerate (white marble pebbles embedded in iron rock), great sheets of lava, and sediments of red earth, solidified in places into half-formed rock. I noticed extensive lava flows which had run towards the west; then we came upon extraordinary quantities of loose white marble pebbles and chips. We made our way down upon a kind of spur of red lava, frightfully slippery for my animals. The poor beasts were quite worn out with fatigue.

From the round dome of the headland we perceived to the south a second great circle of flat-topped heights. The immense flow of red lava on which we were radiated terrific heat which it had absorbed from the sun's rays. My dogs, being nearer the ground than we were, had great difficulty in breathing. Their heads and tails hung low, and their tongues dangled fully out of their mouths. They stumbled along panting pitifully. Even we on our mounts felt nearly suffocated by the stifling heat from the sun above and the lava below. The dogs were amusing enough, curling down quickly to rest wherever a mangy shrub gave the slightest suspicion of a shade. The men, more stupid always than beasts, were sweating and swearing freely, and thumped mercilessly on the rumps of the tired animals with the butts and muzzles of their rifles in order to urge them along.

The very sound of the mules' neck-bells seemed tired and worn; its brisk tinkling of our days of vigour had given room to a monotonous and feeble, almost dead, ding ... dong, at long intervals—well suggesting the exhaustion of the poor animals, which were just able to drag along. The slightest obstacle—a loose stone, a step in the lava, and now one animal, then another, would collapse and roll down, and we had to dismount and help them up on their feet again—quite a hard job, I can tell you, when the animals were nearly dead and would not get up again.

As we went along more and more headlands of the great plateau appeared before us to the west. We still went on descending on the top of the long spur of lava. When not too busy with our animals—and quite out of breath with the heat and stifling air from the heated rock—I sometimes glanced at the glorious panorama on both sides of us. When we had proceeded farther I ascertained that there were really two crescents contained side by side within a larger crescent. Under us to the south a vast undulating plain stretched as far as the eye could see towards the south-west and west. On describing a revolution upon your heels your eye met the other end of the larger crescent plateau to the north-west. The Serra do Tombador extended in a south-westerly direction from north of Diamantino to S. Luiz de Caceres, to the west of the Paraguay River. The height of the spur on which we were was 1,350 ft. above the sea level.

We had come in a great circle on the upper edge. A trail could be seen crossing the great undulating valley below us. It passed at the western terminus of the spur we were on. Evidently that was the trail connecting Diamantino with Cuyabá (the capital of Matto Grosso) via Rosario. The sight of a trail was most exhilarating to my men. Suddenly and quite unexpectedly we came upon a few wretched, tumble-down houses—if one may call them so—smothered in vegetation which grew everywhere. My animals themselves seemed astonished at the unusual sight. The horses neighed and the mules brayed loudly. Masonry work perhaps suggested to them more substantial meals. Down a precipitous ravine, over large boulders and stumbling into big holes, into which the mules disappeared for a few seconds at a time ... there was the main street of Diamantino.

The village—the local people called it "a city"—was the very picture of misery, yet to us it seemed as if we had dropped into the middle of London or Paris. There were a few resident traders, two or three Brazilians, two Italians, and a Turk. All were most hospitable and kind. The chief industry of the place was rubber, which found its way to the coast via the Paraguay River.

Formerly Diamantino was a flourishing place because diamonds were found in abundance. Even now they can be found along the river, but the difficulty of access, even by the easiest way, and the great expense of living there have gradually depopulated the place, which was quite in an abandoned state when I was there.

Here are some of the minimum prices which the rubber collectors had to pay for articles of necessity: Beans, 1s. 6d. to 2s. per litre,[1] or about 4s. a pound; rice, 2s. per litre; flour, 1s. 4d. per litre, about 4s. a pound; sugar, 5s. per kilo (2 pounds), rapadura, or sugar block, 4s. per small cake; tobacco, 5s. per metre of twist; salt, 2s. 8d. to 3s. per litre; coffee, 6s. 6d. per kilo; lard, 6s. 6d. per kilo; purified lard in tins, 16s. to 20s. per 2 kilos. Bars of the commonest laundry soap, 4s. each bar; chickens 10s. to 15s. each; eggs, 10s. to 12s. a dozen; small tins or sardines (containing five sardines) of the most inferior kind, 10s. to 15s. a tin; a one-pound tin of the commonest French salt butter, 15s.

A genial banquet was offered me on my arrival. The school-mistress was set to prepare an excellent and plentiful meal. The mayor and all the notabilities of the place in their Sunday clothing came to fetch me at the house of the firm of Orlando Bros., where I had been most hospitably sheltered, and where I had been requested to wait for them. At the appointed time they arrived—in frock-coats, and each carrying an umbrella.