Brazil and La Plata: The personal record of a cruise

by C. S. Stewart

Large ships cannot approach nearer to the port and city of Desterro than the anchorage of Santa Cruz; a distance of twelve miles. The day after our arrival, a party of officers made a trip to that place in one of the ship’s boats; and on the 4th inst. I joined another, by a similar conveyance. The morning was brilliant, with a cool and bracing air. There was no wind, but with ten stout and willing oarsmen we made good progress, though the tide, for a portion of the distance, was against us. Two beautiful wooded islets lie midway in the straits, or bay, as the water—twelve miles in length and from three to five in width—appears here to be. The largest of these has a battery planted on the north end, the site of which is scarped from the solid rock, about half the height from the water line to the summit of the islet. With the exception of this battery, and two or three buildings connected with it, the whole is one mass of foliage interspersed with boulders of granite. We rowed closely along its western side, and were charmed with the freshness of the verdure and the variety and richness of its growth; especially in the drapery and festooning of parasites and creepers. As we approached our destination we fancied a striking resemblance, in the formation and general aspect of the western side on the mainland, to the section of the Hudson lying between Tarrytown and the entrance to the Highlands. This led to a comparison of the scenery of the straits in general with that of the Hudson. Beautiful indeed as this St. Catherine is, all who had seen both, admitted a close rivalry at least on the part of the other.

A promontory of the island projecting far eastward into the straits, cuts off the view of the town from the north—excepting a church tower or two over the land—and gives to the water the appearance of being land-locked. It is not till sweeping through a narrow channel past the bluff point, you find yourself in a horse-shoe bay,—a half mile perhaps in diameter, with the city encircling its sandy beach.

The view of the town is striking, as, on doubling the point, it opens thus abruptly to the sight. It contains eight thousand inhabitants. It is prettily situated on the widely curving shore, and, facing the straits southward, is flanked on the east by lofty, verdant, and overhanging hills. A double-towered church, rising from the centre of the city, and a spacious snow-white hospital, crowning a terrace on the eastern side, are the most conspicuous of the public buildings.

A small platform of plank on piles, forms the landing for the boats of the shipping; but the canoes of the country are generally run upon the beach. There was a cleanliness about this, and in the market-place adjoining, truly welcome in Brazil, and prepared us to be most pleasantly impressed with the general aspect of a spacious, unenclosed square—like the green, or common of a New England village—upon which we immediately entered. This lies close by the water and in the middle of the town. The principal church or cathedral, whose towers we had seen over the land, ornaments it on the north side. It stands upon a terrace platform, having circular enclosures on either side, filled with plants and shrubbery, and overtopped by two or three graceful palms, and an Australian pine. On the west side near this, is the palace or Governmental House, occupied by the President of the province; the dwellings of two or three wealthy citizens; and a hotel near the water. From the balconies of the last, the party, who had preceded us the day before, were beckoning to us a welcome. The establishment is in charge of an American from New England, married to a native of the place. It is more homelike in general appearance and better kept than any public-house we have seen in South America, excepting the Hotel de Provence in Buenos Ayres.

As it was my purpose to return to the Congress the same evening, there was little time to search for objects of special interest, if indeed there were such; and I contented myself with a walk through and around the place. The streets are laid out with regularity, but are ungraded and pass over hill and through hollow, according to the original surface of the ground. The buildings stand upon them at irregular distances from each other; and many having gardens and yards about them, the whole has a village-like aspect, not indicative of the amount of population embraced within the boundaries of the town. The people seem kind and well disposed; are simple in their habits and courteous in manners. Though my dress furnished no badge of naval service, or distinctive mark of my profession, yet, recognized as a stranger, I was every where saluted as such with the greatest deference and respect. I had been told that a new cemetery, situated on a hill on the western side of the bay, commanded a fine general view of the city and surrounding country. Under the impression that I had reached this, I passed through a fine gateway, and by a flight of steps to a terrace walk, but at once perceived that I was in the grounds of a private residence, and was retreating to the road again, when invited by some attendants near to enter and stroll over the place at my pleasure. This I did. It was tastefully laid out in lawns and flower gardens, and abounded in fruit. On expressing thanks to the Portuguese gardener when taking leave, he added to my obligation by presenting a choice bouquet, with an offer of oranges and other fruit ad libitum: adding, that the signor, his master, would have been happy to receive me had he been at home, and would be pleased at any time with a visit from me.

The day was exceedingly fine, and my ramble of an hour and more in the suburbs, over smooth paths and through hedge-shaded and flower-scented lanes, was most grateful after the dreary monotony of the scenery in the Plata and the tedium of long confinement on board a ship.

The females of Desterro are celebrated for their skill in the manufacture of artificial flowers from feathers, beetle wings, fish scales, and sea shells; and an arrival of strangers in the place causes the doors, and halls, and rooms of the hotel to be thronged with negroes and negresses, bearing tray-loads and boxes of these articles for sale. Many of them are tasteful and ornamental; especially those formed from the polished wings of the beetle. Those of fish-scales wrought into necklaces, armlets, wreaths and bouquets are also pretty; and, were the material not known, would appear costly. The first of these I ever saw were worn by a bride at Montevideo; the effect by candle-light was much that of a set of pearls, which I at first supposed the ornaments to be. A coarse but serviceable thread lace, is also a manufacture of the place. The chief article of commerce is coffee, that of St. Catherine being of superior quality.

At 3 o’clock we sat down to a profusely spread table d’hôte, one of the most tempting public boards I have seen since leaving the United States, consisting of a variety of fish, oysters, lobster, different kinds of meats, chickens, turkey and birds, cooked and served in American style. The bread was excellent, and upon it alone, with the delicious fresh butter from the German settlement of San Pedro d’Alcantara, twenty miles distant in the mountains on the main, I could have made a most satisfactory repast. The interest of the feast was enhanced by some intelligence communicated in regard to the chief attendants on the table: the head waitress was no less a personage than a Princess Royal of Cabinda, eldest daughter of the monarch of that style, and niece of “King John,” chief of the Kroomen. She is a fine intelligent-looking woman of thirty years, whose mien and general bearing were by no means unbecoming the rank she held in her native land. Another of the servants was a male slave of the same age, full of activity and spirit, and seemingly very cheerful and happy. By industry and economy, and the gratuities he has received, for civility and fidelity in his situation, he has laid up the amount of his purchase-money, with the exception of a small sum. He expects soon to be free; and, having caught a spirit of adventure and enterprise from the many of our compatriots, who of late years have touched at St. Catherine’s for refreshment on their way to California, designs pushing his fortunes in that golden region—an example of adventure, in purpose at least, almost without parallel, I am told, among the Brazilians of Portuguese blood. While the whole world has been excited to enterprise by the modern discoveries of gold, not a vessel, I learn, has been fitted out from Brazil in quest of fortune in this way, and scarcely a Brazilian tempted to join the thousands who have touched here and at Rio on their way to California.

The next day I joined Commodore McKeever and his secretary in a stroll on shore at Santa Cruz. Captain Cathcart met us on the beach, and, becoming our cicerone, first led us up a romantic little glen in the rear of his dwelling, by a well kept pathway overshaded with orange trees and palms, and bordered by coffee-plants and bananas. It followed the course of a murmuring and babbling mountain stream, which fretted its way over a bed of rocks, and beneath and around massive boulders of granite. The pathway itself was sufficiently attractive to have induced us to take the walk, but there was, as we found, a special object for pursuing it. It leads to the graves of two sisters of the ages of fifteen and seventeen, daughters of Major Gaines, Governor of Oregon, who died here a year ago on their way to that territory, after a few days’ illness with yellow fever, contracted during a brief stay at Rio. Their sudden death, within a day of each other, in the opening bloom of youth, and their burial by the wayside, as it were, in a strange and undesired land, with the many affecting incidents related to us connected with the event, threw a touching interest around the spot, and caused us to linger with deep sympathy near their graves. They lie side by side within a small, picketed enclosure, where the rose and willow and other appropriate growth, planted by the hand of the Consul, are already spreading in tropical luxuriance. They are said to have been intelligent and accomplished, and full of the buoyancy and hope of young life. The bereavement under the circumstances must have been desolating to the parents, and their burial on these strange shores a most affective trial.

After the examination of a mandioca and coffee plantation, and of a fruit yard, we strolled over a spur of the mountain to an adjoining cove in which Captain Cathcart formerly resided, and which is still his possession. His former dwelling is converted into a school-house for his own children and those of two or three of his neighbors. The tutor, a young Brazilian, is employed by the Consul at his individual expense. The books and school apparatus were most primitive, and limited to the merest elements of instruction; still, the scene presented by the assembled group of scholars and their young teacher, had more of promise in it for the future, than any thing before met in this region.