Roraima and British Guiana, With a Glance at Bermuda, the West Indies, and the Spanish Main

by J. W. Boddam-Whetham

A NEW HOUR—MARABUNTAS—SINKING OF THE BURA—ROCK FORMATIONS—ARA HUMMING-BIRD—FALLS OF YANINZAEC—JABIRU—CABUNI RIVER—SHOOTING FISH WITH ARROWS—PACU—AN INDIAN CAMP—GREEN-HEART BREAD—INDIAN LIFE—A PAIWORIE FEAST—DUCKLARS—CURRI-CURRIS—SUN BITTERNS.

“Thirteen o’clock,” was the extraordinary and invariable announcement with which McTurk roused the slumbering Indians at daybreak. The origin of such an unwonted hour has always been wrapped in mystery to me, but it sufficed that the men understood it, and, a few minutes after the cry had resounded through the camp, coffee was ready, hammocks taken down, boats loaded, and we commenced another day of river travel. Our nights under the purple-hearts had been cool and pleasant, and had prepared us for a day which turned out to be one of incessant falls and rapids. The crews were hardly ever out of the water, and the sun poured down with such power that even the well-tanned backs of the Indians were scorched and blistered.

Between the wooded islands acres of rock rose two or three feet above the water, revealing the most curious formations and indentations, varying in size and shape from perfectly rounded bullet moulds to smooth oval cauldrons. About half-past ten we stopped for breakfast, and whilst it was being prepared I wandered around the island with my gun in search of game, but found nothing. I was not quite unrewarded however, as on passing under a low-hanging bough I received a sharp and painful nip, as if a pair of red hot pincers had taken a piece of flesh out of my back. At first I thought a snake must have stung me, but to my relief on looking back I saw it must have been done by a “marabunta,” whose nest was hanging near.

The sting of these Guiana wasps is extremely painful, and it was predicted that fever would probably set in; although it caused a good deal of inflammation, however, I was none the worse, but avoided marabunta nests in future. When paddling, the Indians were continually annoyed by large bumble-bees, which buzzed about their heads, and sometimes followed the boats for more than a mile; I do not know what attracted them, but as they did not trouble me I could afford to laugh at the frantic efforts of the men to drive them off.

That evening we camped on the left bank of the mainland near a creek, whose cold stream was very refreshing after the warm river water we had been drinking. Here McTurk and some of the crew suffered from slight feverish attacks, but a good dose of quinine set them up again, and next morning they were ready to proceed. On this day we met with an accident which might have occasioned a very serious loss. Two of the boats had been hauled safely up a long rapid, down which the water was rushing with great velocity, but the large one—the Bura-buraloo—was struck by a wave and commenced to sink; the crew, instead of slackening the rope, held on, and only loosened it when it was too late, as the boat drifted a short way down and sank. Fortunately it was not deep, and in less time than it takes to relate we had reached her, and rapidly unloading conveyed her contents to the neighbouring rocks. Then commenced such a drying as probably had never been witnessed on the Mazaruni before. Tarpaulins were laid, and the wet rice, soaked biscuit, and drowned peas spread over them.

The flour was not much damaged, as the water had made a cake round the inside of the barrel which kept the rest dry. The greatest loss we sustained was in the brown sugar, as not more than half was saved, and that in a semi-liquid state. This was a misfortune, as the Indians were intensely fond of sugar, and it formed part of their daily rations; indeed without it their wretchedly made coffee would have been barely drinkable. Knives, forks, and spoons were swept away, and had I not had a small travelling case with another set we should have been badly off. Our guns, clothes, and hammocks happened to be in the boat, and all were in a sad plight, but the sun shone so hot and strong that, though it drove us from the rocks to the shade of an island, everything gradually dried, and after a detention of about four hours we were enabled to proceed. Our camping ground that night was near some rocks whose formation was more extraordinary than that of any we had hitherto seen, resembling the bones of mammoths, and the fossil teeth and jaws of gigantic animals of the old world.

The following day, after ascending a few rapids and traversing the wide stretches of almost still water that lay between them, we stopped for breakfast at a pretty spot where a dry water course between two islands formed a dark cool lane, overhung by the meeting branches. Wandering up this I disturbed a beautiful Ara humming-bird,[44] which I recognised by its two long tail feathers, and the flash of red and golden green. He flew from a dead tree—which had been split down the middle, probably by some wandering Indians to obtain honey, as I found the glutinous remnants of an enormous comb—and then returned to it, but I could not catch another glimpse of him, although I searched long and ardently, as I was anxious to obtain a specimen of this gorgeous little creature.

Near this place we shot some fine macaws, whose long scarlet and blue tail feathers were quickly made into head-dresses by the crew. With the exception of parrots and cranes, we had not seen up to the present time a great variety of birds; the most numerous were orioles, trogons, and toucans. The latter were a never-failing source of amusement, as, with slow and jerky flight like that of a woodpecker, the ungainly birds crossed and recrossed the river, uttering their monotonous cry, “Tucáno, tucáno.” The commonest of this species was the large one called by the Indians “bouradi,” whose enormous bill is of the most brilliant and variegated tints of red, yellow, blue, and black. The crested cassique[45] was another common bird, and the only one which uttered musical sounds; it was very delightful to hear one of them pouring forth his rich and ventriloquial notes, and with raised crest and outspread golden tail singing love-songs to his mate as she swung in her aerial hammock.

Some of the pouch nests of these birds that we saw must have been nearly three feet in length, and, as they are invariably suspended from the ends of most slender boughs, they are safe from the rapacious maws of monkeys and other marauders. As a further precaution against danger, it is said that they always build on trees where the dreaded marabuntas have their nests, and in return for the protection thus afforded feed their young on the larvæ of their patron insects.

We were now approaching what we had heard were the most formidable cataracts in the river, namely, those of Yaninzaec, and hardly had we with difficulty dragged the boats up one set of rapids before we heard a roar of water that betokened a great fall. A turn in the river then brought us in full view of a most picturesque scene. Forming a crescent were five separate cataracts, fifteen or twenty feet in height, and divided from one another by wooded islets. The river rushed with great force over the rocky barriers, and the foam flakes were carried past us in large white masses, or before reaching us were caught in the back eddies and lay like snow-banks under the green bushes.