I have forgotten to mention our visit to the cattle estates of General Crespo, at that time President of Venezuela, a typical son of the llanos. These estates had a frontage of twenty-five leagues along the river, and extend Heaven only knows how far into the interior. The manager, or major-domo, told us that the herds on those estates numbered upwards of 200,000 head of cattle. The figure appears fantastic, but the fact that at that time 1,500 three-year-old bullocks were exported monthly to the neighbouring West India Island, principally Trinidad, may serve as a basis for calculation.
On that eventful 20th of April the breeze blew tantalizingly against us, yet we would not be detained, and decided to advance in its very teeth. The men jumped ashore and pulled the canoes with ropes. The city, built as upon a terrace, soon appeared in the distance, its white, red-roofed houses standing out under the clear sky like dabs of paint upon a blue canvas. Behind the town the hill continued to rise, and opposite the city the river itself, encased into a narrow space, is only one-third of a mile broad. It was a delight to look once more on houses, towers and churches, and other signs of civilized life. The sight was an enchantment after the eternal panorama of forest, mountain, plain and river. We had a feeling akin to that of Columbus and his companions when the watch shouted ‘Land! land!’ We could echo those words in their full significance. The struggle was at an end; river, forest, rapids, fevers, wild beasts, poisonous snakes, savages, and all the obstacles that lay behind us, were over, leaving no further trace than the dust along the roads or the foam of the waves on the sands. Thanks to the Divine protection, we had reached the end of an adventurous journey full of possibilities of mishap and of danger, and all that had taken place was simply as a memory in our minds.
We attracted great attention on landing, and were soon installed in one of the good hotels of the towns. We stared with something like wonderment at mirrors, tables, sofas, as at so many good old friends from whom we had been long separated. In us, primitive man had very soon reasserted full sway, and we had to make some effort to return to the habits and customs of civilized life. As soon as we could, we placed ourselves in the hands of a barber in the town. He had been told of our great store of luggage, and, inquisitive as all men of his profession are, on hearing one of us humming for very joy under his razor and shears, asked (I know not whether in innocence or banter): ‘How many of you are in the company, and what opera are you going to begin with?’ To this I replied: ‘We are not an opera company, but a circus, and our performances will begin shortly; we are on the look-out for a clown.’ He did not proceed with his cross-examination.
Ciudad Bolivar is famous in the annals of Venezuelan and Colombian history. It bears the name of the emancipator of those regions. Formerly it was called Angostura, which means ‘the Narrows.’ In 1819 one of the first Colombian Congresses was held at that city, and its deliberations, which soon crystallized into action, brought about the expulsion of the Spaniards after a daring and sanguinary series of campaigns. The very men who sat at Ciudad Bolivar, 300 miles from the shores of the Atlantic, ended their military campaign on the plateau of Ayacucho in 1824, having marched thousands of leagues across plain and forests, snow-capped mountains, precipices, jungle, fighting for every inch of ground against the stubborn soldiers of Spain in one of the most heroic and tenacious struggles on both sides that are to be found in the annals of history.
The river, as I have stated before, narrows after its long pilgrimage, and, even as a regiment which closes its ranks, rolls its waves in denser array opposite the city. No sooner does it reach the outside limits than it broadens again, and, after running through fertile plains and swampy valleys for a distance of 600 kilometres, reaches the sea. The normal depth opposite Ciudad Bolivar is 120 metres. During the rainy season the level rises from 10 to 20 metres.
Verily the Orinoco is a living, wandering sea of fresh water gathered from the northern plains of South America, which forms the tribute of those lands to the Atlantic Ocean. We had just followed it in its pilgrimage for a long part of its course. We had known it in tempest and in calm; we had watched the dawn gilding its throbbing waters or the twilight covering them with flickering shadows; we had listened to the whispering of the winds and the roar of the hurricane along its shores; we had seen the monsters which roam in its waters, admired the river’s Titanic sport, dashing in the rapids, or its majestic quiet in the deep basins of granite where the current seems to rest before leaping in a wild onslaught through the cañons; and now we saw it majestically unroll before our eyes in the august pageant of its last procession to the ocean. We could not but think that, if that great artery of palpitating life which vibrates through the centre of the continent had stood us in such good service, its possibilities for the development of those vast unknown territories, when once appreciated by humanity, were practically unlimited. To our mind’s eye, prophetic with desire, the vast solitudes we had left behind became resonant glad with the presence of myriads of men; the forests were cleared, the plains tilled, and a happy and prosperous nation, the outcome of the present struggling democracies that own those lands, increased by swarms of immigrants from distant overcrowded countries, reared its cities and towns along the banks of the river which, in its immutable, defiant majesty and power, still rolled to the sea, serving men, but remaining a bond of union, a mighty link between the Cordilleras and the ocean.
CHAPTER XIX
I have thus far sought to give an idea of my personal impressions during a journey most memorable to me; and I am aware that I bring no new or useful contribution from a scientific point of view. We had no instruments of observation, not even an ordinary every-day compass, enabling us to fix the cardinal points with certainty. Furthermore, had we possessed more complicated instruments, we were too ignorant to use them. Let these remarks be borne in mind should errors of appreciation be noticed, as certainly they exist, in this disjointed narrative.
We wandered on with the definite aim of reaching the Atlantic Ocean. Beyond that we did not venture to scrutinize too deeply the mysterious and wonderful manifestations of Nature, but took them as they appeared to our limited means of vision and understanding, and sought nothing beyond.
However, before closing these pages, assuming that some kind reader’s patience may have enabled him to accompany me thus far, it may not be amiss to give some accurate data which I take from the admirable monograph entitled ‘South America: an Outline of its Physical Geography,’ published in the Geographical Journal of April, 1901, by Colonel George Earl Church, a book which might be called ‘South America in a Nutshell,’ wonderfully accurate and concise, and worthy of the highest praise.