August 12th.—This morning we rose early and walked into town. Great pains have been taken with the environs of Pará, and the Rua de Nazareth is one of the broad streets leading into the country, and planted with large trees (chiefly mangueiras) for two or three miles out of town. On our way we saw a lofty palm-tree completely overpowered and stifled in the embrace of an enormous parasite. So luxuriant is the growth of the latter that you do not perceive, till it is pointed out to you, that its spreading branches and thick foliage completely hide the tree from which it derives its life; only from the extreme summit a few fan-like palm-leaves shoot upwards as if trying to escape into the air and light. The palm cannot long survive, however, and with its death it seals the doom of its murderer also. There is another evidence, and a more pleasing one, of the luxuriance of nature on this same road. The skeleton of a house stands by the wayside; whether a ruin or unfinished, I am unable to say, but at all events only the walls are standing, with the openings for doors and windows. Nature has completed this imperfect dwelling;—she has covered it over with a green roof, she has planted the empty enclosure with a garden of her own choosing, she has trained vines around the open doors and windows; and the deserted house, if it has no other inmates, is at least a home for the birds. It makes a very pretty picture. I never pass it without wishing for a sketch of it. On our arrival in town we went at once to the market. It is very near the water, and we were much amused in watching the Indian canoes at the landing. The “montaria,” as the Indian calls his canoe, is a long, narrow boat, covered at one end with a thatched roof, under which is the living-room of the family. Here the Indian has his home; wife and children, hammock, cooking utensils,—all his household goods, in fact. In some of the boats the women were preparing breakfast, cooking the coffee or the tapioca over a pan of coals. In others they were selling the coarse pottery, which they make into all kinds of utensils, sometimes of quite graceful, pretty forms. We afterwards went through the market. It is quite large and neatly kept; but the Brazilian markets are only good as compared with each other. The meats are generally poor; there is little game to be seen; they have no variety of vegetables, which might be so easily cultivated here, and even the display of fruit in the market is by no means what one would expect it to be. To-night Mr. Agassiz goes off with a party of gentlemen on an excursion to some of the islands in the harbor. This first expedition in the neighborhood of Pará, from which the Professor promises himself much pleasure, is planned by Dr. Couto de Magalhaês, President of the Province.[[47]]
August 14th.—We are very agreeably surprised in the climate here. I had expected from the moment of our arrival in the region of the Amazons to be gasping in a fierce, unintermitting, intolerable heat. On the contrary, the mornings are fresh; a walk or ride between six and eight o’clock is always delightful; and though during the middle of the day the heat is certainly very great, it cools off again towards four o’clock; the evenings are delightful, and the nights always comfortable. Even in the hottest part of the day the heat is not dead; there is always a breeze stirring. Mr. Agassiz returned this afternoon from his excursion in the harbor, more deeply impressed than ever with the grandeur of this entrance to the Amazons and the beauty of its many islands, “An archipelago of islands,” as he says, “in an ocean of fresh water.” He describes the mode of fishing of the Indians as curious. They row very softly up the creek, having first fastened the seine across from shore to shore at a lower point, and when they have gained a certain distance above it, they spring into the water with a great plash and rush down the creek in a line, driving the fish before them into the net. One draught alone filled the boat half full of fish. Mr. Agassiz was especially interested in seeing alive for the first time the curious fish called “Tralhote” by the Indians, and known to naturalists as the Anableps tetrophthalmus. This name, signifying “four-eyed,” is derived from the singular structure of the eye. A membranous fold enclosing the bulb of the eye stretches across the pupil, dividing the visual apparatus into an upper and lower half. No doubt this formation is intended to suit the peculiar habits of the Anableps. These fishes gather in shoals on the surface of the water, their heads resting partly above, partly below the surface, and they move by a leaping motion somewhat like that of frogs on land. Thus, half in air, half in water, they require eyes adapted for seeing in both elements, and the arrangement described above just meets this want.
August 19th.—To-night at ten o’clock we go on board the steamer, and before dawn shall be on our way up the river. This has been a delicious week of rest and refreshment to me. The quiet country life, with morning walks in the fresh, fragrant lanes and roads immediately about us, has been very soothing after four months of travel or of noisy hotel life. The other day as we were going into town we found in the wet grass by the roadside one of the most beautiful mushrooms I have ever seen. The stem was pure white, three or four inches in height, and about half an inch in diameter, surmounted by a club-shaped head, brown in color, with a blunt point, and from the base of this head was suspended an open white net of exquisitely delicate texture, falling to within about an inch of the ground; a fairy web that looked fit for Queen Mab herself.[[48]] The week, so peaceful for me, has been one, if not of rest, at least of intense interest for Mr. Agassiz. The very day of his arrival, by the kindness of our host, his working-rooms were so arranged as to make an admirable laboratory, and, from the hour he entered them, specimens have poured in upon him from all quarters. His own party make but a small part of the scientific corps who have worked for and with him here. In Pará alone he has already more than fifty new species of fresh-water fishes; enough to reveal unexpected and novel relations in the finny world, and to give the basis of an improved classification. He is far from attributing this great success wholly to his own efforts. Ready as he is to work, he could not accomplish half that he does, except for the active good-will of those about him. Among the most valuable of these contributions is a collection made by Mr. Pimenta Bueno, of the so-called fishes of the forest. When the waters overflow after the rainy season and fill the forest for a considerable distance on either side, these fish hover over the depressions and hollows, and as the waters subside are left in the pools and channels. They do not occur in the open river, but are always found in these forest retreats, and go by the name of the “Peixe do Mato.”
Mr. Agassiz has not only to acknowledge the untiring kindness of individuals here, but also the cordial expression of sympathy from public bodies in the objects of the expedition. A committee from the municipality of the city has waited upon him to express the general satisfaction in the undertaking, and he has received a public demonstration of the same kind from the college. The bishop of the province and his coadjutor have also been most cordial in offers of assistance. Nor does the interest thus expressed evaporate in empty words. Mr. Pimenta Bueno is director of the Brazilian line of steamers from Pará to Tabatinga.[[49]] The trip to Manaos, at the mouth of the Rio Negro, is generally made in five days, allowing only for stoppages of an hour or two at different stations, to take or leave passengers and to deposit or receive merchandise. In order that we may be perfectly independent, however, and stop wherever it seems desirable to make collections, the company places at our disposition a steamer for one month between Pará and Manaos. There are to be no passengers but ourselves, and the steamer is provided with everything necessary for the whole company during that period,—food, service, &c. I think it may fairly be said that in no part of the world could a private scientific undertaking be greeted with more cordiality or receive a more liberal hospitality than has been accorded to the present expedition. I dwell upon these things and recur to them often, not in any spirit of egotism, but because it is due to the character of the people from whom they come to make the fullest acknowledgment of their generosity.
While Mr. Agassiz has been busy with the zoölogical collections, Major Coutinho has been no less so in making geological, meteorological, and hydrographic investigations. His regular co-operation is invaluable, and Mr. Agassiz blesses the day when their chance meeting at the Palace suggested the idea of his joining the expedition. Not only his scientific attainments, but his knowledge of the Indian language (lingua geral), and his familiarity with the people, make him a most important coadjutor. With his aid Mr. Agassiz has already opened a sort of scientific log-book, in which, by the side of the scientific name of every specimen entered by the Professor, Major Coutinho records its popular local name, obtained from the Indians, with all they can tell of its haunts and habits.
I have said nothing of Mr. Agassiz’s observations on the character of the soil since we left Rio, thinking it best to give them as a whole. Along the entire length of the coast he has followed the drift, examining it carefully at every station. At Bahia it contained fewer large boulders than in Rio, but was full of small pebbles, and rested upon undecomposed stratified rock. At Maceió, the capital of the province of Alagôas, it was the same, but resting upon decomposed rock, as at Tijuca. Below this was a bed of stratified clay, containing small pebbles. In Pernambuco, on our drive to the great aqueduct, we followed it for the whole way; the same red clayey homogeneous paste, resting there on decomposed rock. The line of contact at Monteiro, the aqueduct station, was very clearly marked, however, by an intervening bed of pebbles. At Parahyba do Norte the same sheet of drift, but containing more and larger pebbles, rests above a decomposed sandstone somewhat resembling the decomposed rock of Pernambuco. In the undecomposed rock below, Mr. Agassiz found some fossil shells. In the neighborhood of Cape St. Roque we came upon sand-dunes resembling those of Cape Cod, and wherever we sailed near enough to the shore to see the banks distinctly, as was frequently the case, the bed of drift below the shifting superficial sands above was distinctly noticeable. The difference in color between the white sand and the reddish soil beneath made it easy to perceive their relations. At Ceará, where we landed, Mr. Agassiz had an opportunity of satisfying himself of this by closer examination. At Maranham the drift is everywhere conspicuous, and at Pará equally so. This sheet of drift which he has thus followed from Rio de Janeiro to the mouth of the Amazons is everywhere of the same geological constitution. It is always a homogeneous clayey paste of a reddish color, containing quartz pebbles; and, whatever be the character of the rock in place, whether granite, sandstone, gneiss, or lime, the character of the drift never changes or partakes of that of the rocks with which it is in contact. This certainly proves that, whatever be its origin, it cannot be referred to the localities where it is now found, but must have been brought from a distance. Whoever shall track it back to the place where this peculiar red soil with its constituent elements forms the primitive rock, will have solved the problem. I introduce here a letter written by Mr. Agassiz, a few days later, to the Emperor, which will better give his views on the subject.
A BORD DE L’ICAMIABA, SUR L’AMAZONE,
le 20 Aout, 1865.
Sire:—Permettez moi de rendre un compte rapide à Votre Majesté, de ce que j’ai observé de plus intéressant depuis mon départ de Rio. La première chose qui m’a frappé en arrivant à Bahia, ce fut d’y trouver le terrain erratique, comme à la Tijuca et comme dans la partie méridionale de Minas, que j’ai visitée. Ici comme là, ce terrain, d’une constitution identique, repose sur les roches en place les plus diversifiées. Je l’ai retrouvé de même à Maceio, à Pernambuco, à Parahyba do Norte, à Ceará, à Maranham, et au Pará. Voilà donc un fait établi sur la plus grande échelle! Cela démontre que les matériaux superficiels, que l’on pourrait désigner du nom de drift, ici comme dans le Nord de l’Europe et de l’Amérique, ne sauraient être le résultat de la décomposition des roches sous-jacentes, puisque celles-ci sont tantôt du granit, tantôt du gneiss, tantôt du schiste micacé ou talqueux, tantôt du grès, tandis que le drift offre partout la même composition. Je n’en suis pas moins aussi éloigné que jamais de pouvoir signaler l’origine de ces matériaux et la direction de leur transport. Aujourd’hui que le Major Coutinho a appris à distinguer le drift des roches décomposées, il m’assure que nous le retrouverons dans toute la vallée de l’Amazône. L’imagination la plus hardie recule devant toute espèce de généralisation à ce sujet. Et pourtant, il faudra bien en venir à se familiariser avec l’idée que la cause qui a dispersé ces matériaux, quelle qu’elle soit, a agi sur la plus grande échelle, puisqu’on les retrouvera probablement sur tout le continent. Déjà j’apprends que mes jeunes compagnons de voyage ont observé le drift dans les environs de Barbacena et d’Ouro-Preto et dans la vallée du Rio das Velhas. Mes résultats zoologiques ne sont pas moins satisfaisants; et pour ne parler que des poissons, j’ai trouvé à Pará seulement, pendant une semaine, plus d’espèces qu’on n’en a décrit jusqu’à présent de tout le bassin de l’Amazône; c. à. d. en tout soixante-trois. Cette étude sera, je crois, utile à l’ichthyologie, car j’ai déjà pu distinguer cinq familles nouvelles et dix-huit genres nouveaux et les espèces inédites ne s’élèvent pas à moins de quarante-neuf. C’est une garantie que je ferai encore une riche moisson, lorsque j’entrerai dans le domaine de l’Amazône proprement dit; car je n’ai encore vu qu’un dixième des espèces fluviatiles que l’on connait de ce bassin et les quelques espèces marines qui remontent jusqu’au Pará. Malheureusement M. Burkhardt est malade et je n’ai encore pu faire peindre que quatre des espèces nouvelles que je me suis procurées, et puis près de la moitié n’ont été prises qu’en exemplaires uniques. Il faut absolument qu’à mon retour je fasse un plus long séjour au Pará pour remplir ces lacunes. Je suis dans le ravissement de la nature grandiose que j’ai sous les yeux. Votre Majesté régne sans contredit sur le plus bel empire du monde et toutes personelles que soient les attentions que je reçois partout où je m’arrête, je ne puis m’empêcher de croire que n’était le caractère généreux et hospitalier des Brésiliens et l’intérêt des classes supérieures pour le progrès des sciences et de la civilisation, je n’aurais point rencontré les facilités qui se pressent sous mes pas. C’est ainsi que pour me faciliter l’exploration du fleuve, du Pará à Manaos, M. Pimenta Bueno, au lieu de m’acheminer par le steamer régulier, a mis à ma disposition, pour un mois ou six semaines, un des plus beaux bateaux de la compagnie, où je suis instalé aussi commodément que dans mon Musée à Cambridge. M. Coutinho est plein d’attention et me rend mon travail doublement facile en le préparant à l’avance par tous les renseignements possibles.
Mais je ne veux pas abuser des loisirs de Votre Majesté et je la prie de croire toujours au dévouement le plus complet et à l’affection la plus respectueuse