By the old captain I was informed that the mission was established in the year 1730, by a Lieut. Colonel Wencisläo Gomez, who came up with troops from Pernambuco, and conquered the Coroá nation of Indians, being that from which the present race is descended; at that time they formed three Aldeas, and amounted in all to about 1,000 individuals. These three Aldeas were united to form the present one, Duro, which place is called in their own language Ropechedy, signifying beautiful situation, a title which it well merits. Here also I found that the inhabitants lived in constant fear of the Cherente Indians, who inhabit the woods on the banks of the Rio Tocantins to the north-west of Duro. These Indians have made several attacks on the mission, but the occasion on which they committed the greatest havock, was in the year 1789, when a body of them amounting to upwards of two hundred, surrounded the Aldea one morning about ten o’clock, and before evening had burned all the houses in the outskirts of the Aldea, and killed about forty persons, including men, women, and children. They also carried away four children, two of whom were nephews of the old captain. The inhabitants of the Aldea kept up a constant fire upon the Cherentes, but they could not tell how many of them were killed, as they took all their dead with them when they left.
On several nights, during our stay at the Mission, fires were seen on the Serras at no great distance, and one day, as one of the inhabitants was returning from the woods, he saw an Indian, armed with his bow and arrows, cross the path before him. These circumstances caused the inhabitants to dread another attack, and they were but poorly prepared to meet it. Formerly they used to have a supply of arms and ammunition sent to them every year by the government, but for many years past, these had not been furnished to them, and the old ones were nearly worn out. In cases of necessity, the government can call upon the captains to take the field with their men, and each can raise about forty, able to carry arms. A few of these Indians have guns of their own, which they use in hunting, and their powder is a coarse kind, manufactured by themselves. Some of the shopkeepers in the towns to the south-west, every year go down by the Rio Tocantins to Pará to sell hides and purchase European goods; very frequently some of the young men belonging to Duro hire themselves to work the canoes, and with the money which they receive for their services, purchase at Pará axes and other iron tools; a party of them returned from one of these trips during our visit.
During the fortnight we remained in the Aldea do Duro, I was principally occupied in drying the immense collection of specimens obtained in the latter part of the journey across the Geräes and the Chapada da Mangabeira, and in packing up all those which had been procured between Santa Rosa and Duro. I also made many excursions in the neighbourhood of the Aldea, and notwithstanding it was then the end of the dry season, I found it an excellent field for my researches. The sandy marshes yielded me many curious Eriocaulons, and beautiful Melastomaceæ; while the upland campos produced several species of Diplusodon, many Compositæ, Labiatæ, &c.; but the most common, as well as the most beautiful of the productions of the campos, were a small Bignonia growing in tufts, and scarcely a foot high, bearing numerous large lemon-coloured trumpet-shaped flowers, an Ipomæa, similar in habit and about the same size, producing large violet-coloured blossoms (Ipomæa hirsutissima, Gardn.) and two erect kinds of Echites:[10] in dry rocky places Amaryllis Solandræflora, Lindl., was very common, producing abundantly its large yellow flowers.
We left Duro on the thirteenth of October, and slept at the house of one of the Indians, about two leagues distant from the Aldea: the owner of it, hearing on what day I was to leave, arrived the night before, and begged of me to call at his house, which was but a little way off the road, to see his wife who had been blind for some years, and was then suffering from ophthalmia. I, of course, could not refuse his request, and the poor fellow tried to make us as comfortable as his miserable residence would allow. This place was called Cachoeira, from a small waterfall near it; the high undulating hills which surrounded the valley in which the house stood, gave it a very picturesque appearance. There were two other houses at a short distance from that in which we slept, and although they are surrounded by the finest possible grounds for plantations, the three families have but one small spot planted with mandiocca, which seemed to be the only article they cultivate. Although there were abundant pastures in the neighbourhood, not one of them possessed a single cow, and their excuse for not having one, was the trouble it would give them to make a fence round their plantation; rather than do any manual labour of that kind, they prefer lounging about the house in a state of idleness, or going out in the woods with their gun and axe, in search of game and wild honey. Our farinha being nearly exhausted, I enquired whether any was to be had at this place, but they had none, nor would they have a supply for a month to come, as the mandiocca was not yet ripe; fortunately a young man passed in the evening with a very small quantity which he at first refused to sell, as he was taking it to a neighbour in return for some he had borrowed; he consented, however, to let me have half of it, on condition of receiving dried beef in exchange, which, as we had then plenty, I agreed to.
On the journey from Duro to this place, we traversed a beautiful country of hill and dale, much of it being thinly wooded; some of the more open upland fields, owing to the recent rains, were covered with new grass about a foot high, on which no animals fed, excepting a few wild deer. It is a general custom among the cattle farmers, to burn the pastures at the end of the dry season, in order that the new grass may spring up rapidly on the setting in of the rains; this is also done by the inhabitants of the mission, but with the view to keep their hunting grounds more open, and encourage the visits of deer. It seems probable, that at no very distant period the whole of this district, and much of the country that lies to the east and north-west, will be converted into large cattle farms, as it is well calculated for the rearing of cattle, owing to the mildness of the climate, and the abundance of grass and water which exists here all the year round.
The rain prevented our leaving Cachoeira on the following day till two o’clock in the afternoon, when after a journey of two leagues, we arrived at the house of the Juiz de Paz of Duro; on account of the bad state of the roads it was dusk before we accomplished this distance. The first league and a half of our journey was over a hilly rocky country, when we began to descend the Serra do Duro, and shortly afterwards entered upon a flat rather thickly-wooded tract. It is at the foot of the Serra that the mission of Duro terminates, and about half a mile from it stands the house in which the Juiz de Paz resided; it was exceedingly small, and as the outer room, that generally given to travellers, would not conveniently hold us, he told me we should find much better accommodation at the house of a relation of his, who lived about a gunshot distant, and he kindly accompanied us thither. On reaching it, we found half a dozen Indians, sitting round a fire under a verandah in front of the house, and superintending the cooking of their supper in a large pot. While we were arranging our trunks against the wall, the master of the house begged of us to wait till the men had taken out their beds, when each came and carried his away, which however consisted of nothing more than half a cow’s hide; they sleep here as in the Aldea, stretching the hide in a corner, on which they lie without taking off their clothes; I saw no one make use of a hammock.
A journey of three leagues from the residence of the Juiz de Paz, through a flat thinly-wooded country, almost destitute of herbaceous vegetation, (no rains having as yet fallen in this quarter,) brought us to a fazenda, situated on the banks of the Rio de Manoel Alvez, a large stream which takes its rise in the Serra do Duro, to the north of the Aldea, and falls into the Rio Tocantins. At this fazenda we were informed, that as the river had risen considerably, it would be impossible for our horses to cross with their loads; and the canoe used for ferrying over passengers and luggage, had been carried away by the floods of the previous season, circumstances which rendered it necessary to have everything transported across the river on men’s heads. At the fazenda I engaged a negro and a mulatto, to assist my own men in this operation; the ferry was about a mile further down; here the river is about forty yards broad and the current very strong, in consequence of a rapid which exists a little further below. When the two men, who both were tall and strong, entered with the first loads, it was with difficulty they could keep their feet, as the water, during the greater part of the way, took them up to the shoulders; the recompense they asked, half a dollar each, was, however, very dearly earned, as they had each to cross the river backwards and forwards about twelve times, which occupied more than two hours. Mr. Walker and I attempted to cross a little above the ferry by swimming, but the force of the current swept us both over the rapids; Mr. Walker being carried with great force against some rocks, and it was with no small difficulty, that he reached the opposite side below the rapid in a state of great exhaustion. I was more fortunate, being carried down at a place clear of rocks, where I soon regained the same bank of the river I had just left. I returned to the ferry, where I succeeded in crossing, being assisted by one of the men, for I was too low in stature to be able to bear up against the current alone. After this delay we resumed our journey, with the intention of halting during the night at a fazenda about a league further, but finding we had still ample time, we pushed on to a village called Almas, about two leagues to the westward, which we reached about sunset. The country we passed after crossing the river was nearly flat and thinly wooded, but not so much scorched up as that we traversed in the morning.
The village of Almas is situated in a hollow, and consists of a few irregular streets, the houses of which are low and of mean appearance, being built of large unburned bricks, made of clay mixed with chopped grass and dried in the sun. The number of its inhabitants amounts to about 800, by far the greater part of whom are blacks and mulattos, and intermixtures between these and Indians. The Juiz de Paz was a creole negro, who could neither read nor write; he was the principal shopkeeper in the village, and annually made a journey to Bahia to purchase goods. The village contains a church, which is in about as ruined a condition as that of Duro, and, in like manner, has no resident priest. Although the neighbourhood presents abundance of excellent ground for plantations, not one was here to be seen. Upon our arrival I fully expected to be able to purchase some farinha, but none was to be had; it was indeed only as a great favour that a person who came to consult me professionally, sold me a little rice. Every one was complaining of the scarcity of provisions, and the want of money, but not a word was said about the indolence and idleness, which no doubt was the cause of the famine that now existed among them. In consequence of almost incessant rains, we were obliged to remain in the village four days.
Our first stage from Almas was to a fazenda, called Galheiro Morto, said to be only two leagues farther, but I have no doubt its real distance was nearly four, judging from the time we took to perform the journey. The leagues in this part of the country have never been measured, and as the land was originally bought by the league, it was the interest of the purchaser to take as large a portion as he could obtain; in the province of Piauhy, we found the leagues much longer than those of Ceará but those of Goyaz even exceeded them. This difference is so manifest, that they are designated as the short one (legoa pequena), and the long one (legoa grande); the shorter league I always found to be quite long enough, and whenever the long one was to be travelled over, I usually calculated the time necessary for accomplishing two short ones, and, indeed, I seldom found it required less. We halted at this place till the afternoon, when another journey of three leagues brought us to a little hamlet, consisting of about half a dozen houses, called Morhinos. The owner of the house where we put up for the night, returned from the woods shortly after our arrival, with a considerable quantity of wild honey, some of which he kindly gave us, and we found it to be excellent; it was the product of one of the smaller bees which are so numerous in this part of Brazil. This was the season in which the people go to the woods in search of honey; it is so generally used, that after leaving Duro, a portion was presented to us at almost every house where we stopped. These bees mostly belong to the genus Melipona, Illig., and I collected a great many, which with some other zoological specimens were afterwards lost in crossing a river. A list of them with their native names and a few observations may not be uninteresting.
1. Jatahy.—This is a very minute yellowish-coloured species, being scarcely two lines long. The honey, which is excellent, very much resembles that of the common hive-bee of Europe.