Unfortunately, I happen to be afflicted with myopia, which at a certain distance blurs the outline of objects large or small.
As we continued to advance I could distinguish that someone was coming towards us. My courage evaporated; I felt sure that this must be some hostile Indian intent on hindering our access to the longed-for caney. I would fain have turned tail, but vanity, which is the source of nine-tenths of the displays of human courage, pricked me on. My ears awaited the wild whoop of the advancing Indian, and my eyes were prepared to witness the onslaught of his ferocious braves from the neighbouring bushes. Yet the die was cast, and forward we went.
Imagine my surprise when, from the approaching figure, still indistinct and vague to my short-sighted eyes, a greeting of the utmost courtesy in the purest Castilian rang forth in the air of the clear afternoon. I shall never forget it. Those words in my native tongue, uttered in the midst of that wilderness, 500 leagues from the nearest town or civilized settlement, conjured up in one moment cherished memories of a distant world.
Greatly relieved, I put aside my weapons of assault and destruction, which, to speak the truth, were most inconvenient to walk in.
I knew before, and am more convinced than ever since that day, that I am not compounded of the clay of heroes: in which I am like the rest of the world. Peace and peaceful avocations are much more in my line. I love heroes—military ones especially—in books, in pictures, or in statues; as every-day companions, I believe—not having met any heroes in the flesh—that they must be unbearable. They really owe it to themselves to get killed or to die the moment they have attained their honours. They are sure to be ruined if left to the vulgarizing influences of daily life, mixing with the rest of humanity in every-day toil and strife. You cannot have your bust or portrait in Parliament or Assembly, your niche in the cathedral or in public hall, and your equestrian statue with your horse eternally lifting his fore-legs for the edification of coming generations, and at the same time insist on walking about the streets in the guise of a commonplace mortal! If you live in bronze and marble, if your name fills half a column of the encyclopædia, and appears as a noble example in the books in which children are taught to consider brutal violence the highest evolution of human intellect and action, you cannot ask your humble companions on earth to put up with you in their midst. Heroes should find their places, and stick to them, for their own greater glory and the comfort of their fellow-men.
The gentleman whom we met was named Aponte, and came from Caracas, the capital of Venezuela. He had been appointed to the governorship of the Amazon Territory. After spending several years in its capital, San Carlos, he became afflicted with cataract. People told him that the Vichada Indians cured cataract with the juice of certain herbs, which they kept secret. He had arrived at Santa Catalina about ten days before us, accompanied by his sister and a young Corsican who had been in his employ at San Carlos. An Indian woman from one of the tribes had taken him in charge, and made daily applications of some milky juice extracted from plants, and, strange to say, he found relief. I have since heard that he is completely cured.
An occulist, who travelled through those regions two or three years later, investigated the truth of these alleged cures, and found them to be authentic. He could not, however, induce the Indians to tell him what they use. This knowledge of the virtue of plants amongst the Indians is found in nearly all tropical lands. Quinine, to which humanity owes so much, was also an Indian secret, and was discovered by a well-known combination of circumstances. Towards the middle of the eighteenth century, in one of the Peruvian States, the Indians were treated very cruelly by their masters. The daughter of the house won the love of the Indian slaves by her kindness and charity. It had been noticed that no Indians died from malarial and other fevers, which proved fatal to the white men, but what means they employed could not be learned either by threats or entreaties.
The daughter of the cruel master was taken ill. Her nurse, an Indian woman, gave her some concoction which saved her life, but would not reveal the secret for years. On her deathbed she told her young mistress what plant it was that the Indians employed against fever. Thus the cinchona, or Peruvian bark, was discovered. In the Choco regions in Colombia, which teem with snakes, the Indians know not only the plants that cure the bite and counteract the poison, but those which confer immunity. They also have a combination of substances forming a sort of paste, which, when applied to the wounds and ulcers of man or animal, however sore they may be, exercise a healing and immediate action.
I had an uncle, Dr. Triana, well known to European botanists, and especially to collectors of orchids, to several varieties of which his name is linked (the numerous varieties of Catleya trianensis are named after him). He lived for a long time in the Choco region, and brought back large quantities of this paste, which he used with success in cases of wounds and ulcers, both in Europe and America, but he could never persuade the Indians to tell him its exact composition.
The young Corsican whom we found with Mr. Aponte was a sort of globe-trotter, jack-of-all-trades, hail-fellow-well-met with everybody. He was an explorer, a dentist, could serve as barber if required, had acted as clerk to Mr. Aponte, had with him a fairly well-stocked medicine-chest, and proved to be a first-rate cook. He either knew something of medicine or made up for ignorance by his daring. At any rate, he took our sick companion in hand, administered to him some of his drugs, and in two or three days restored him to perfect health. This was a great blessing. Thus disappeared from our horizon the only ominous cloud which darkened it during those days of so much sunlight and freedom. Those who know not what tropical fevers are can form no idea of the dread that their presence inspires when one sees them stealthily gaining ground. At times they act slowly, and give one a chance of struggling against them, but often they develop with lightning rapidity, and a man in full health and in the bloom of life is cut down suddenly in a few days or in a few hours.