The Smuggler Chief: A Novel

by Gustave Aimard

At last when the traveller has succeeded in surmounting the dangers we have described and a thousand others no less terrible which we have passed over in silence, he finds himself in front of an Indian city. That is to say, he is before one of those mysterious cities into which no European has ever penetrated, whose exact position is ever unknown, and which since the conquest have served as the refuge of the Araucanian civilization.

The fabulous tales told by some travellers about the incalculable riches contained in these cities have inflamed the greed and avarice of a great number of adventurers, who, at various periods, have attempted to find the lost road to these queens of the llanos and Pampas of the Cordillera. Others merely impelled by the irresistible attractions which extraordinary enterprises offer to, vagabond imaginations, have also started, during the last fifty years, in search of the Indian cities, but, up to the present day, success has not crowned a single one of these expeditions.

Some of the travellers have returned disenchanted and half killed by this journey toward the unknown; a certain number left their bodies at the base of precipices or in the quebradas to serve as food for birds of prey; and, lastly, others, more unhappy still, have disappeared without leaving a trace, and no one has ever known what became of them.

We, in consequence of circumstances too lengthy to repeat here, but which we may possibly narrate some day, have involuntarily inhabited one of these impenetrable cities, and, more fortunate than our predecessors, we succeeded in escaping through a thousand perils, all miraculously avoided. The description we are about to give is therefore scrupulously exact, and will not admit of doubt, since we speak from personal knowledge.

Garakouaïti, the city which appears before us, when we have at last crossed the virgin forest, extends from north to south in the form of a rectangle. A wide stream, over which are thrown several stone bridges of incredible lightness and elegance, passes through its entire length. At each corner of the square an enormous block of rock, cut perpendicularly on the side facing the country, serves as an almost impregnable fortification. These four citadels are also connected together by a wall, twenty feet thick at the top, and forty high, which inside the town forms an incline whose base is sixty feet in width. This wall is built of the bricks of the country, which are about a yard long, and called adobes, and surrounds the town. A wide deep ditch doubles the height of the walls.

Two gates alone offer entrance to the city: they are flanked by turrets, exactly like a mediæval castle; and what supports our comparison is, that an extremely narrow and light bridge of planks, which can be removed upon the slightest alarm, is the sole communication between the gate and the exterior.

The houses are low, and have terraced roofs connected with each other: they are light, and built of reeds and canaverales covered with cement, owing to the earthquakes so frequent in these countries; but they are large, airy, and have numerous windows. They are all one storey high, and their front is covered with a varnish of dazzling whiteness.

The narrow streets, which intersect each other at right angles, converge upon an immense square, situated in the centre of the city, and bearing the name of Ikarepantou (the square of the sun). It is probable that it was in honour of the sun that the Indians designed this square, whence all the streets of the city radiate, for it is impossible to imagine a more correct representation of the planet which they venerate, than this symmetrical arrangement.

Four magnificent palaces stand in the direction of the four cardinal points, and on the western side is the great temple of Chemiin-Sona, surrounded by an infinite number of carved gold and silver columns. The appearance, of this building is most beautiful: it is reached by a flight of twenty steps, each made of a single marble slab ten yards long; the walls are excessively lofty, and the roof, like that of the other buildings, is terraced, for the Indians, who are well versed in the art of constructing subterranean vaults, are ignorant of the formation of domes.

The interior of the temple is relatively most simple. Long pieces of tapestry, worked with feathers of a thousand hues, and representing the entire history of the Indian religion, cover the walls. In the centre stands an isolated altar surmounted by a sun glistening with gold and precious stones, and supported by the sacred tortoise. By an ingenious artifice, the first beams of the rising sun fall on this splendid idol, and make it flash with the most brilliant colours, so that it appears to become animated, and really illumines all surrounding objects. In front of this altar stands the sacrificing table, which resembles the one we described when relating the ceremony which Leon Delbès witnessed in the Indian camp. We will state at once that human sacrifices are daily becoming rarer, and now only take place under entirely exceptional circumstances. The victims are selected from persons condemned to death, or prisoners of war.