Brazil and La Plata: The personal record of a cruise

by C. S. Stewart

As we were strolling through the little hamlet, a straggling suburb of the village of San José, we were told by a passer-by that an American was living close at hand—pointing out to us his residence. We found this to be a cobbler’s shop, and our compatriot in it a cobbler: a scapegrace, as we soon learned, from no less noted a place of apprenticeship than the “Mammoth” boot-store in Chatham Square, New York. He is about twenty-eight years of age, has been eleven years at St. Catharine’s, and is married here; but notwithstanding, is confessedly still much of a “Bowery boy,” and no great honor to his country. A Bible in English, lying on the counter, was the only evidence of good we discovered during our interview, in which he did a small job in his line for one of us. His boast of Protestantism, and of his defences of the truth amid the superstition and idolatry, as he termed it, in which he lives, did not pass for much in our estimation, interlarded as his conversation was, with oaths and other proofs of moral degradation.

At two o’clock we were mounted for San Pedro d’Alcantara; Adams and S—— on horses, G—— and I on mules. Adams, wearing a low-crowned, broad-brimmed, black felt hat, seemed to be literally stuffed into the drab cotton shooting-jacket, which he had added to the shirt in which we first met him. The other most conspicuous article of his dress was a pair of tan-colored boots, reaching to his knees, with saddle-bag tops, put to the use here of a portmanteau. G—— and S—— each wore over their coats a gaily striped Buenos Ayres poncho; whilst I was provided with a boat-cloak, as a defence against sun, wind, and rain. We set off with fine weather and in high spirits. We had long become so weary of the monotony of life on board ship at Montevideo, and the confinement of our passage hither, that the change was most welcome; and we ambled off through a sandy lane leading directly inland from the water, as cheerily as if just escaping from prison.

On gaining the height of the first ridge, we had an extensive view over a wide valley covered with wood. It surprised me to see so wide an extent of level and seemingly rich land, immediately on the coast, unredeemed; but we learned that beneath the wood it is a mere swamp. The rising grounds skirting it, present abundant evidence of the productiveness of the soil: plantations of coffee, sugar-cane, mandioca, cotton, Indian corn, and the castor oil plant, were spread widely around, while the orange groves were so laden with fruit, as to appear in the sun like masses of gold. The road for many miles was broad and smooth, lined with hedges of mimosa and wild orange, and ornamented here and there by clusters of roses and jessamine. By degrees, however, as we advanced in the mountains, especially in the ascent and descent of spurs of hills, it became narrow and rough, and little more than a bridle-path. The country became proportionally new and uncultivated; still in many places it was homelike, from the meadows and rich bottom lands which here and there bordered the mountain stream, which we began now closely to follow towards its sources. A thousand beautiful pictures in outline and foliage were presented during the ride of the afternoon, enlivened and varied by the windings of the small river beside us—flowing at times through lawnlike banks as smoothly as the waters of a lake, and then again rushing, and leaping, and foaming amidst gigantic boulders of granite, down rapids and over cascades, with the tumult and uproar of a cataract.

We had constant evidence along the road, in the new dwellings and outbuildings of the inhabitants, of their improving circumstances and advancing civilization. This was conspicuous in more than one instance in three successive specimens of architecture in a single habitation, by the additions made at different times. First, there was the little cabin, composed of small sapling-like timbers, wattled and filled in with mud and coarsely and rudely thatched, now rickety and ready to tumble down, the original shanty of a settler in the wilderness; next, and joined to it some years later, another more spacious in its area, and of more substantial frame, more smoothly plastered and more elaborately thatched—more neat in the finish of its door and window frames, and entire workmanship; and lastly, the recently constructed cottage of stone, stuccoed and whitewashed, and roofed with tile—bearing testimony of the prosperity and the improved domestic accommodations of its owner. This is descriptive of the Brazilian section of the country, before we came in the neighborhood of the German colony; though the same fact was observable in a more marked degree among the European immigrants.

Night overtook us when yet a league from our destination. Most of this distance was made in such darkness that we could not distinguish an object around us; not even the road we were travelling. We could only follow the lead of our guide, trusting to the eyesight and sagacity of our beasts, for security in mounting sharp hills and in making steep descents beside the roaring waters and shelving precipices. The way thus began to be tedious and we to feel weary. A bright light from a large and cheerful dwelling near the road side, before which our guide halted, led to the hope that we had reached the end of our day’s journey. This Adams was desirous of making it; but, after an animated parlance in German, in which the whole of a large family, men, women and children, who had crowded to the door, joined, while we, wayworn riders, looked wistfully at the brightness and seeming comfort within, he was told that we could not be accommodated, and must push our way through the darkness and chill mists of the mountains, a mile further. Slight showers of rain now began to fall from the heavy clouds overhead. When at last we did come to a halt, and were invited to dismount, the only object discernible was the dim light of a lamp amidst the bottles of a little grog-shop and grocery, six feet by ten. We found, however, that it opened on one side into a room of somewhat greater dimensions; and this again in the rear into a kennel-like hole, filled with children of all ages, from one to eight and ten years, most of them very primitively clad, and some so much so as to be entirely naked.

It was at once very evident that this barnlike room, open overhead to the rafters, and furnished only with a coarse heavy table and two or three rude wooden benches, was to be both our supper room and dormitory: the grog-shop on one corner and the kennel behind, constituting the rest of the dwelling. Hungry and weary we gladly made ourselves at home in it. The civility of the landlord, and his manifest desire to do honor to guests under the protection of so distinguished a patron as Mynheer Adams, but especially the early appearance of a trim and active little German girl of eighteen, with neatly arranged hair and blooming complexion, moving about with the self-possession and dignity of an heiress, though without stockings, and for shoes the clumsy sabots or wooden slippers of the country, began to raise our hopes as to fare and accommodations.

Soon the savory fumes and musical hissing of ham and eggs, in a frying-pan in the adjoining penthouse, and the aroma of coffee, gave further encouragement to our empty stomachs. A snowwhite cloth was at the same time spread over one end of the bar-room table; and it was not long before we were seated at a very palatable meal, which the personal cleanliness of the little cook and waiting-maid encouraged us to dispatch without any very close inspection of the plates on which it was served, or the particular condition of the black knives and five-pronged German silver forks with which it was eaten. In the mean time we had become somewhat enlightened as to the domestic condition of the household. The lady of the mansion had given birth the day before to a sixth son, and was lying in a little dark recess on one side of the rear shanty: mother and son doing well. The maid-of-all-work was a sister in charge of the household during the confinement.

Shortly after our arrival a new character was introduced, in the person of a German doctor, in attendance on the mother and child: a man of talent and education, we were told, but now, from habits of drunkenness, a poor degraded wretch, shabby in dress, and filthy in person. He soon rendered himself utterly disgusting to us, by the profaneness and vulgarity of the broken English by which he attempted to commend himself to us, as travellers. He came from the fatherland somewhat more than a year ago, with the German legion furnished by Brazil, in the allied armies of the Plata, for the overthrow of Rosas. In this, he was a surgeon, but forfeited his commission through intemperance. He was disposed at first to be very friendly, and to address us as “hail fellow well met.” The advances were received so very coldly, however, especially on the point of most interest to him, the participation of a glass of grog, that after a word to the sick, he took his departure in the darkness and rain for another grog-shop, as we were told, to meet more congenial companions.

The cravings of hunger relieved, we began to cast a look around as to the promise of rest for the night, after the weariness of a rough and rapid ride of twenty-five miles. The bare and dirty floors, and narrow and hard benches along the walls, seemed to furnish the only choice of couches. We had made up our minds to this alternative; and, so far as my companions were concerned, with a half shiver as to the degree of comfort held out. The mountain air was not only damp, but positively cold. In addition to my saddle for a pillow, I had a thick cloak in which to wrap myself, but G—— and S——, with nothing to cover them but their light ponchos, had the prospect of half freezing. A shrug of the shoulders, however, chiefly indicated the nature of their thoughts on the subject. To our relief, a large rush mat was early spread in one corner of the room, and immediately afterwards, with triumphant looks of gratulation to one another, we beheld our host with his little sister-in-law lugging in from the adjoining apartment an immense straw bed, of dimensions sufficient for the accommodation of half a dozen persons. Spread out to its largest extent, and furnished with bolsters, clean sheets and blankets, it looked so tempting, that, arranging the cloak and ponchos for additional covering, and laying aside our coats, boots, and cravats, we were soon in the indulgence of the rest to which it invited us. We were constrained by Christian civility to offer to our guide a fourth part of the couch. In anticipation of his acceptance, I had chosen for myself an outside berth, where I supposed I should be the farthest removed from him. He declined the place offered, however, and spreading a sheepskin saddlecloth and other gear on the floor, took up his quarters beside me. Thus my selfish manœuvre was in vain, and the big German was my next bedfellow. It was well for my repose that I was right weary; for he soon began puffing and snorting in his sleep with the labor and noise of a high-pressure steam-engine, which otherwise would have effectually kept me awake. We were four in a row; but there was no lack, as I soon discovered, of numerous other bedfellows. Flattering myself that they were nothing worse than fleas in clean and polished armor, I did not allow myself to be disturbed by them; but leaving them to skip, hop, and jump as they pleased without hindrance, I slept soundly till morning, and rose without a vestige of fatigue.

I was all impatience to know what kind of a place, under the disclosures of daylight, San Pedro d’Alcantara would prove to be. On hastening to the door, for the windows without sash or glass were closed by board shutters, the first object that met my eyes was the little rustic chapel of the settlement, perched on the top of a beautifully wooded and round-topped hill. It is picturesque and rural, and the most conspicuous and ornamental object in the landscape. The place itself is a hamlet of a dozen dwellings, most of them mere huts. Half the number are plastered and whitewashed, and in place of thatch have roofs of red tile. The mountain stream, whose course we had followed from the bay at San José, here a small rivulet, flows through its centre. The little valley in which the hamlet is embosomed, is encircled by hills of more or less steepness, most of them still covered with trees and underwood, and presents all the features of a new and frontier settlement at home. After breakfast, accompanied by Adams and our host, who adds to his occupation of publican the office of sexton to the church, we ascended the hill to the chapel. It is most rude in its architecture both within and without, and is furnished with several frightful daubs, of what are intended for saints and angels. A cemetery surrounds the chapel. It contains a few graves, and is encircled by a broad path for the convenience of religious processions. There is no parish priest; but an itinerant ecclesiastic makes a quarterly visit for confession and absolution, and the celebration of mass. In answer to my inquiries on the subject, our host said, “We come up to the chapel every Sunday morning and every saint’s day, and make a procession, and do what we can, and then go down and drink, dance, and sing, and enjoy ourselves the rest of the day!”