Up the Amazon and Madeira rivers, through Bolivia and Peru

by Edward D. Mathews

We stopped for the night on the left bank, at a very large playa, which was so soft and muddy, that in trying to go after some ducks, I got thoroughly into it, and had to crawl out on hands and knees. Through this I spoiled a good pair of high boots; for my boy, who should have washed and dried them carefully, put them right into the fire for the second operation, and burnt the fronts completely off. During the night the south wind increased to almost a gale, and we were cold and miserable till morning.

June 14th. We did not start till 5.30 a.m., and made but poor progress on account of the gale which, blowing down on us, keeps us back. The men, also, are apparently quite unable to put out any power, and look more like a lot of blue-faced mummies than men, for it is curious how blue the Indians seem to turn when suffering intense cold, which certainly knocks them up much more than the hottest sun does. The country now appears more open, and extensive pampas are now very frequently occurring. This day we could only work about twelve hours, and at night the gale moderated.

June 15th. Started at 3.30 a.m., the day breaking cold and dull like the preceding ones, but the wind had somewhat moderated from that of yesterday, which might be termed half a gale.

The men still seemed in a numbed state, and it was impossible to get the least exertion out of them, for they paddle in an inert and wretched manner during the continuance of the cold. My thermometer had unfortunately got broken, but I should judge that the mercury would have stood very near, if not below, 50° Fahr.

At breakfast time to-day we found, on landing and passing through the fringe of forest on the bank, that we had arrived at the “chocolotales” of Exaltacion so that at last we had arrived near to some sort of civilization. These “chocolotales” appear to be very extensive and are found on both sides of the river, but to discover them it is necessary to go ashore and push one’s way through the belt or fringe of chuchia and brushwood that has been left all along the river bank. These plantations of cocoa trees, or “chocolotales,” as they are called, were made in the last century by the Mojos Indians of the department of the Beni, who were gathered together from their wandering habits, and formed into villages by the Jesuit missionaries of the Spanish South American dependencies of Peru and Bolivia. They are very extensive, and are now claimed as government properties, being farmed out, by the authorities of Exaltacion and Trinidad, to speculators who make good profits, as there is no labour, or very little, expended in clearing. At the proper season, which is during the months when the river is in flood, from February to March, the Cayubaba Indians from Exaltacion descend to these plantations, and collecting the cocoa pods which are then ripe, clear the trees somewhat of the dead leaves and rubbish that has fallen during the year, leaving the chocolotales to the savages and wild animals until the collecting time again comes round.

During the afternoon we passed a succession of these chocolotales, and also some small clearings, or “chacos,” with plantains and other fruits growing in abundance. Each chaco has its hut, where the Cayubabas live during the few months in which they stay upon their plantations; but there were no inhabitants, the proper season for staying down the river having gone by. The absence of the proprietors did not, however, keep my fellow-travellers and the Indian boatmen from helping themselves to all the plantains and pumpkins that they could lay their hands on; and I was told that it was an understood custom that all travellers should help themselves as freely as they wished at these plantations, which are the first that parties ascending the rapids into Bolivia can arrive at.

Hereabouts we had to cross to the right bank to avoid a very strong current; and having to go under a very long stretch of falling bank, we very narrowly escaped being buried by a fall of many tons of earth. While paddling along, our captain saw ahead, small pieces of earth dropping down the straight wall of the bank, and just had time to sheer out into mid-river when down the mass came, very nearly bringing with it a lofty tree, which, had it fallen, would certainly have reached us with its topmost branches. Canoes ascending the river are much exposed to this danger, and in passing under these falling banks a constant watch must be kept.

To-day we found an arrow floating down the river, which the men declared to belong to the Chacobo tribe of savages that roam about in these districts; the arrow was of same size, form, and make as those used by the Caripunas and Pacaguaras of the Rapids.

At night we stopped opposite to the “Estancia de Santiago,” the first of the cattle feeding-grounds of Bolivia that one arrives at in ascending the Mamoré. This was formerly the property of Don Barros Cardozo, Brazilian Consul in the Beni for some years, and who had been murdered by one of his Brazilian servants only a few weeks previously, as we had been informed by the canoes we met descending the river at the Misericordia Rapid. We now learned that the assassin had been hunted by the mayordomo, and other servants of the deceased consul, for some days, until he was discovered endeavouring to escape down the river in a small canoe; and that, as he refused to surrender and menaced his pursuers with the same knife with which he had murdered his master, he was shot down and killed without waiting for process of law. This estancia is reported to have nearly 8000 head of cattle, and I was informed that, had the consul not lost his life, he had intended to drive a large number of his cattle by land from Guajará Merim to San Antonio. From the estancia to the first cachuela, the cattle would have been taken in canoes or on rafts—a comparatively easy work, as the navigation is entirely free from other obstacle than the playas or banks of sand which stretch out into the river at low water, leaving, however, in every case a channel deep enough and wide enough for craft that do not draw much water. Pasturage for the cattle would be easily found at night along the river banks, which are covered with “capim,” a rough wild grass, or “chuchia,” the wild cane, the succulent points of which are greedily eaten by the cattle. Oxen in the estancias of Mojos are worth from fifteen to twenty “pesos faibles,” say about £2 10s. to £3 10s. a head, while at San Antonio and on the higher Madeira they are worth from eighty to one hundred milreis, or £8 to £10.