“to shine in courts,
Or grace the humbler walks of life.”
CHAPTER XXIX.
Constantia.
November 22d.—A few days at “Boa Esperenza” in the mountains of Tejuca, ten miles from Rio, proved so interesting to my friend Dr. C—— and myself, that we determined to make a more distant excursion of the kind to this place, in the midst of the Organ Mountains, fifty miles from the city. The route to it passes near San Aliexo, and on our way we made an agreeable visit of three days to our friends there.
Constantia is the estate of Mr. Heath, an Englishman, which has become a favorite resort of the citizens of the metropolis in the summer season as a watering-place, for the enjoyment of pure and invigorating air, and the luxury of fresh and wholesome diet in the country. By previous arrangement, mules and a guide were sent for us two days ago to San Aliexo by the proprietor; and taking leave of Mr. and Mrs. M——, we were off for our destination after an early breakfast this morning. The day was splendid in its coloring, and full of freshness. Our guide, a bright, intelligent little negro of twelve, was all activity and good-nature; and mounted on a mule scarcely larger than himself, with a carpet-bag slung on each side of him in the manner of a pair of saddle-bags, went on his way whistling and singing as if he knew neither sorrow nor care. Instead of leading us, however, he rode behind in the fashion of a groom; but not so much for appearance, as we soon discovered, as to give a poke with the pointed end of his whip to one or the other of the animals ridden by me and my friend, when they became disposed to lag in their gait, or to start them forward by a sharp cut across their rumps with its lash.
The first stage of eight miles northward was to Freischal, an inland venda, or store, where the turnpike begins the ascent of the “Sierra.” For that distance, the plain is very similar in its general features to the country between Piedade and San Aliexo, before described. The mountain scenery to the west, close upon the left, was, however, very fine; and was marked now, after heavy rains, by numerous watercourses and cascades, which foamed down from the heights above, in single shoots of hundreds of feet. Most travellers from Rio make Freischal a stopping-place for the first night; but the “Barriera,” or toll gate, midway up the ascent, four miles further, is a much more picturesque and attractive spot; and we pushed on to this for luncheon, without alighting at the other. The road after passing Freischal winds at first in gradual ascent along the broad bases of the mountains. It is wide, smooth, and well graded; and paved at intervals for long distances with large cubes of granite, like a Roman highway. It was enlivened by troupe after troupe of mules passing in both directions, with heavy loads of produce from the interior, and of merchandise from the capital: each company of seven animals being under charge of a troupiero, or muleteer, though frequently moving by hundreds together, and sometimes crowding the road thickly for a half mile in succession. As thus seen en masse in the distance, either in meeting or overtaking them, they present an odd spectacle. The mules with heads bending to the ground beneath their burdens, are themselves for the most part completely hidden by the bulky loads they carry. The tips of their long ears, bobbing up and down with the motion of their step; the cross ends of the clumsy wooden saddle or frame, to which the panniers or other burdens on either side are affixed—something like the buck of a woodsawyer—sticking out above their shoulders; and the dried ox-hides surmounting the whole, to protect the articles transported from the weather, flapping like wings up and down in the irregular tread of the beasts, are alone seen: and to one unacquainted with the sight, would present objects in natural history difficult to be guessed at. There is a leading mule to each troupe, whose bridle and head-stall are gayly ornamented with tufts of scarlet and blue worsted, and often with showy plumes of the same material, and also strung with bells of varied sizes and tones—the whole a matter of rivalry in the taste and vanity of the respective troupieros. The leaders are so well trained as to allow no one of their own troupe, under any circumstances, to pass ahead of them on the road; so that the muleteers have to look out only for such as lag behind or stray by the wayside. These men themselves are black, and white, and of every shade of complexion; are of all ages, and in an endless variety of costume, as to the material and condition of old shirts and old jackets, old trowsers and old drawers, old hats and various head-gear—from the well clothed, to those almost in a state puris naturalibus.
The Barriera is as wild and romantic a spot as can be well imagined. I recollect nothing on a public road surpassing it, in these respects, unless it be the site of Alhama, in the sierra of the Alpuxares. It is a narrow ravine high upon the mountain’s side, above which the fantastic pinnacles called the “Pipes of the Organ,” bristle thousands of feet. From these a mountain torrent, foaming and roaring over and around gigantic boulders of granite, comes rushing down, and divided into two streams by an islet over which the road crosses, plunges headlong into a gulf below. In the midst of this islet, to which a bridge from either side is thrown, a neat little chapel, surmounted by a cross, rises upon the sight with pleasing effect, in contrast with the savage wildness of every thing around. At a neat venda just beyond, to which we had been directed by Mr. M——, we were served with a luncheon of boiled eggs and bread and butter. Our host was a civil young Portuguese, and the neatly whitewashed walls of the room in which we ate, were ornamented with a set of colored engravings, illustrative of the fate of Inez de Castro in the hands of Peter the Cruel. For the first time in my rambles in Brazil, I here saw a book in the hands of any one—it was a copy of the “Complete Letter Writer” in Portuguese, which the keeper of the shop was reading behind the counter when we went in.
We were now more than a thousand feet above the level of the plain. For some time before reaching this point, a beautifully shaped and luxuriantly-clothed mountain in front of us, had particularly attracted our attention. It here stood directly beside us on the right. Nothing of the kind can surpass the beauty of its foliage in varied forms and tints of green—interspersed with masses of white and of yellow, of purple and of scarlet. The white in many instances is not a blossom, but the leaves of the sloth tree—cecropia peltata. The under sides of these are covered with a white down; the leaves curl upward under the hot rays of the sun, and give to the whole tree-top, amid masses of verdure, a whiteness almost as pure, and more silvery, than that of the snowball. The yellow blossoms are chiefly of the acacia; the purple and the scarlet those of climbers—bignonias and fuchsias. An American forest in October can scarcely compare in gorgeousness with these gay woods, in the seasons of their bloom.