“In the discussion of the development theory in its present form, a great deal is said of the imperfection of the geological record. But it seems to me that, however fragmentary our knowledge of geology, its incompleteness does not invalidate certain important points in the evidence. It is well known that the crust of our earth is divided into a number of layers, all of which contain the remains of distinct populations. These different sets of inhabitants who have possessed the earth at successive periods have each a character of their own. The transmutation theory insists that they owe their origin to gradual transformations, and are not, therefore, the result of distinct creative acts. All agree, however, that we arrive at a lower stratum where no trace of life is to be found. Place it where we will: suppose that we are mistaken in thinking that we have reached the beginning of life with the lowest Cambrian deposit; suppose that the first animals preceded this epoch, and that there was an earlier epoch, to be called the Laurentian system, beside many others older still; it is nevertheless true that geology brings us down to a level at which the character of the earth’s crust made organic life impossible. At this point, wherever we place it, the origin of animals by development was impossible, because they had no ancestors. This is the true starting-point, and until we have some facts to prove that the power, whatever it was, which originated the first animals has ceased to act, I see no reason for referring the origin of life to any other cause. I grant that we have no such evidence of an active creative power as Science requires for positive demonstration of her laws, and that we cannot explain the processes which lie at the origin of life. But if the facts are insufficient on our side, they are absolutely wanting on the other. We cannot certainly consider the development theory proved, because a few naturalists think it plausible: it seems plausible only to the few, and it is demonstrated by none. I bring this subject before you now, not to urge upon you this or that theory, strong as my own convictions are. I wish only to warn you, not against the development theory itself, but against the looseness in the methods of study upon which it is based. Whatever be your ultimate opinions on this subject, let them rest on facts and not on arguments, however plausible. This is not a question to be argued, it is one to be investigated.
“As I have advanced in these talks with you, I have become more and more dissatisfied, feeling the difficulty of laying out our work without a practical familiarity with the objects themselves. But this is the inevitable position of one who is seeking the truth: till we have found it, we are more or less feeling our way. I am aware that in my lectures I have covered a far wider range of subjects than we can handle, even if every man do his very best; if we accomplish one tenth of the work I have suggested, I shall be more than satisfied with the result of the expedition. In closing, I can hardly add anything to the impressive admonitions of Bishop Potter in his parting words to us last Sunday, for which I thank him in your name and my own. But I would remind you, that, while America has recovered her political independence, while we all have that confidence in our institutions which makes us secure, that so far as we are true to them, doing what we do conscientiously and in full view of our responsibilities we shall be in the right path, we have not yet achieved our intellectual independence. There is a disposition in this country to refer all literary and scientific matters to European tribunals; to accept a man because he has obtained the award of societies abroad. An American author is often better satisfied if he publish his book in England than at home. In my opinion, every man who publishes his work on the other side of the water deprives his country of so much intellectual capital to which she has a right. Publish your results at home, and let Europe discover whether they are worth reading. Not until you are faithful to your citizenship in your intellectual as well as your political life, will you be truly upright and worthy students of nature.”
At the conclusion of these remarks a set of resolutions was read by Bishop Potter.[[15]] They were followed by a few little friendly speeches, all made in the most informal and cordial spirit; and so ended our course of lectures on board the Colorado. Later in the day we observed singular bright red patches in the sea. Some were not less than seven or eight feet in length, rather oblong, and the whole mass looked as red as blood. Sometimes they seemed to lie on the very top of the water, sometimes to be a little below it, so as only to tinge the rippling surface. One of the sailors succeeded in catching a portion of it in a bucket, when it was found to consist of a solid mass of little crustaceans, bright red in color. They were all very lively, keeping up a constant rapid motion. Mr. Agassiz examined them under the microscope and found them to be the young of a crab. He has no doubt that every such patch is a single brood, floating thus compactly together like spawn.
CHAPTER II.
RIO DE JANEIRO AND ITS ENVIRONS.—JUIZ DE FORA.
Arrival.—Aspect of Harbor and City.—Custom-House.—First Glimpse of Brazilian Life.—Negro Dance.—Effect of Emancipation in United States upon Slavery in Brazil.—First Aspect of Rio de Janeiro on Land.—Picturesque Street Groups.—Eclipse of the Sun.—At Home in Rio.—Larangeiras.—Passeio Publico.—Excursion on the Dom Pedro Railroad.—Visit of the Emperor to the Colorado.—Cordiality of Government to the Expedition.—Laboratory.—Botanical Garden.—Alley of Palms.—Excursion to the Corcovado.—Juiz de Fora Road.—Petropolis.—Tropical Vegetation.—Ride from Petropolis to Juiz de Fora.—Visit to Senhor Lage.—Excursion to the “Forest of the Empress.”—Visit to Mr. Halfeld.—Return to Rio.—News of the Great Northern Victories, and of the President’s Assassination.
April 23d.—Yesterday at early dawn we made Cape Frio light, and at seven o’clock were aroused by the welcome information that the Organ Mountains were in sight. The coast range here, though not very lofty, (its highest summits ranging only from two to three thousand feet,) is bold and precipitous. The peaks are very conical, and the sides slope steeply to the water’s edge, where, in many places, a wide beach runs along their base. The scenery grew more picturesque as we approached the entrance of the bay, which is guarded by heights rising sentinel-like on either side. Once within this narrow rocky portal, the immense harbor, stretching northward for more than twenty miles, seems rather like a vast lake enclosed by mountains than like a bay. On one side extends the ridge which shuts it from the sea, broken by the sharp peaks of the Corcovado, the Tijuca, and the flat-topped Gavia; on the other side, and more inland, the Organ Mountains lift their singular needle-like points, while within the entrance rises the bare bleak rock so well known as the Sugar Loaf (Paō de Assucar). Were it not for the gateway behind us, through which we still have a glimpse of the open ocean, and for the shipping lying here at anchor, leaving the port or entering it, we might easily believe that we were floating on some great quiet sheet of inland water.
We reached our anchorage at eleven o’clock, but were in no haste to leave the ocean home where we have been so happy and so comfortable for three weeks past; and as the captain had kindly invited us to stay on board till our permanent arrangements were made, we remained on deck, greatly entertained by all the stir and confusion attending our arrival. Some of our young people took one of the many boats which crowded at once around our steamer, and went directly to the city; but we were satisfied with the impressions of the day, and not sorry to leave them undisturbed. As night came on, sunset lit up the mountains and the harbor. In this latitude, however, the glory of the twilight is soon over, and as darkness fell upon the city it began to glitter with innumerable lights along the shore and on the hillsides. The city of Rio de Janeiro spreads in a kind of crescent shape around the western side of the bay, its environs stretching out to a considerable distance along the beaches, and running up on to the hills behind also. On account of this disposition of the houses, covering a wide area and scattered upon the water’s edge, instead of being compact and concentrated, the appearance of the city at night is exceedingly pretty. It has a kind of scenic effect. The lights run up on the hill-slopes, a little cluster crowning their summits here and there, and they glimmer all along the shore for two or three miles on either side of the central, business part of the town.
Soon after our arrival Mr. Agassiz received an official visit from a custom-house agent, saying that he had orders to land all our baggage without examination, and that a boat would be sent at any day and hour convenient to him to bring his effects on shore. This was a great relief, as the scientific apparatus, added to the personal luggage of so large a party, makes a fearful array of boxes, cases, &c. It would be a long business to pass it all through the cumbrous ceremonies of a custom-house. This afternoon, while Mr. Agassiz had gone to San Christovāo[[16]] to acknowledge this courtesy and to pay his respects to the Emperor, we were wandering over a little island (Ilha das Enxadas) near which our ship lies, and from which she takes in coal for her farther voyage. The proprietor, besides his coal-wharf, has a very pretty house and garden, with a small chapel adjoining. It was my first glimpse of tropical vegetation and of Brazilian life, and had all the charm of novelty. As we landed, a group of slaves, black as ebony, were singing and dancing a fandango. So far as we could understand, there was a leader who opened the game with a sort of chant, apparently addressed to each in turn as he passed around the circle, the others joining in chorus at regular intervals. Presently he broke into a dance which rose in wildness and excitement, accompanied by cries and ejaculations. The movements of the body were a singular combination of negro and Spanish dances. The legs and feet had the short, jerking, loose-jointed motion of our negroes in dancing, while the upper part of the body and the arms had that swaying, rhythmical movement from side to side so characteristic of all the Spanish dances. After looking on for a while we went into the garden, where there were cocoa-nut and banana trees in fruit, passion-vines climbing over the house, with here and there a dark crimson flower gleaming between the leaves. The effect was pretty, and the whole scene had, to my eye, an aspect half Southern, half Oriental. It was nearly dark when we returned to the boat, but the negroes were continuing their dance under the glow of a bonfire. From time to time, as the dance reached its culminating point, they stirred their fire, and lighted up the wild group with its vivid blaze. The dance and the song had, like the amusements of the negroes in all lands, an endless monotonous repetition. Looking at their half-naked figures and unintelligent faces, the question arose, so constantly suggested when we come in contact with this race, “What will they do with this great gift of freedom?” The only corrective for the half doubt is to consider the whites side by side with them: whatever one may think of the condition of slavery for the blacks, there can be no question as to its evil effects on their masters. Captain Bradbury asked the proprietor of the island whether he hired or owned his slaves. “Own them,—a hundred and more; but it will finish soon,” he answered in his broken English. “Finish soon! how do you mean?” “It finish with you; and when it finish with you, it finish here, it finish everywhere.” He said it not in any tone of regret or complaint, but as an inevitable fact. The death-note of slavery in the United States was its death-note everywhere. We thought this significant and cheering.
April 24th.—To-day we ladies went on shore for a few hours, engaged our rooms, and drove about the city a little. The want of cleanliness and thrift in the general aspect of Rio de Janeiro is very striking as compared with the order, neatness, and regularity of our large towns. The narrow streets, with the inevitable gutter running down the middle,—a sink for all kinds of impurities,—the absence of a proper sewerage, the general aspect of decay (partly due, no doubt, to the dampness of the climate), the indolent expression of the people generally, make a singular impression on one who comes from the midst of our stirring, energetic population. And yet it has a picturesqueness that, to the traveller at least, compensates for its defects. All who have seen one of these old Portuguese or Spanish tropical towns, with their odd narrow streets and many-colored houses with balconied windows and stuccoed or painted walls, only the more variegated from the fact that here and there the stucco has peeled off, know the fascination and the charm which make themselves felt, spite of the dirt and discomfort. Then the groups in the street,—the half-naked black carriers, many of them straight and firm as bronze statues under the heavy loads which rest so securely on their heads, the padres in their long coats and square hats, the mules laden with baskets of fruit or vegetables,—all this makes a motley scene, entertaining enough to the new-comer. I have never seen such effective-looking negroes, from an artistic point of view, as here. To-day a black woman passed us in the street, dressed in white, with bare neck and arms, the sleeves caught up with some kind of armlet, a large white turban of soft muslin on her head, and a long bright-colored shawl passed crosswise under one arm and thrown over the other shoulder, hanging almost to the feet behind. She no doubt was of the colored gentry. Just beyond her sat a black woman on the curbstone, almost without clothing, her glossy skin shining in the sun, and her naked child asleep across her knees. Or take this as another picture: an old wall several feet wide, covered with vines, overhung with thick foliage, the top of which seems to be a stand for the venders of fruits, vegetables, &c. Here lies at full length a powerful negro looking over into the street, his jetty arms crossed on a huge basket of crimson flowers, oranges and bananas, against which he half rests, seemingly too indolent to lift a finger even to attract a purchaser.
April 25th.—Nature seems to welcome our arrival, not only by her most genial, but also by her exceptional moods. There has been to-day an eclipse of the sun, total at Cape Frio, sixty miles from here, almost total here. We saw it from the deck of the ship, not having yet taken up our quarters in town. The effect was as strange as it was beautiful. There was a something weird, uncanny in the pallor and chill which came over the landscape; it was not in the least like a common twilight, but had a ghastly, phantom-like element in it. Mr. Agassiz passed the morning at the palace where the Emperor had invited him to witness the eclipse from his observatory. The clouds are poor courtiers, however, and unfortunately a mist hung over San Christovāo, obscuring the phenomenon at the moment of its greatest interest. Our post of observation was better for this special occasion than the Imperial observatory, and yet, though the general scene was perhaps more effective in the harbor than on the shore, Mr. Agassiz had an opportunity of making some interesting observations on the action of animals under these novel circumstances. The following extract is from his notes. “The effect of the waning light on animals was very striking. The bay of Rio is daily frequented by large numbers of frigate-birds and gannets, which at night fly to the outer islands to roost, while the carrion-crows (urubús) swarming in the suburbs, and especially about the slaughterhouses of the city, retire to the mountains in the neighborhood of Tijuca, their line of travel passing over San Christovāo. As soon as the light began to diminish, these birds became uneasy; evidently conscious that their day was strangely encroached upon, they were uncertain for a moment how to act. Presently, however, as the darkness increased, they started for their usual night quarters, the water-birds flying southward, the vultures in a northwesterly direction, and they had all left their feeding-grounds before the moment of greatest obscurity arrived. They seemed to fly in all haste, but were not half-way to their night home when the light began to return with rapidly increasing brightness. Their confusion was now at its height. Some continued their flight towards the mountains or the harbor, others hurried back to the city, while others whirled about wholly uncertain what to do next. The re-establishment of the full light of noon seemed to decide them, however, upon making another day of it, and the whole crowd once more moved steadily toward the city.”