CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIITHE VALLEY OF THE MAGDALENA“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...Al contemplar tu frente coronadaDe los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,Lleno solo de ti, siento mi almaArrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,Que entre profundos remolinos braman,De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1—Manuel M. Madiedo.While in Guaduas we met a Scotch engineer, who was superintendent of a gold mine in the mountains west of Honda. Desiring to know the truth about the excessive temperature of this place, about which we had heard so many reports, we asked him if it was really true that the heat in Honda was as intense as represented.“You will,” he said, “find it the hottest place you have ever visited. It is certainly the most torrid place I know, and I have been something of a globe-trotter in my time. Hades, if I have caught the meaning of the word, as used in the Revised Version, is quite temperate in comparison with it. Business frequently calls me to Bogotá, and, on my way thither, I must necessarily pass through Honda, but I never stop there longer than is absolutely necessary, and I always try to avoid being there in the daytime. If I must stop there for a few hours, I time my journey so as to arrive there at night, and make it a point to leave before morning. Hot? I think it is the hottest and most suffocatingspot on earth. It has always been a mystery to me how people can live there at all. I know of nothing to compare it with except one of the burning pits of Dante’s Inferno.”Had we not learned by long experience how to discount such statements, the prospect of spending some days in a town with such a reputation for grilling the stranger within its gates, would have been anything but inviting. But we had heard similar reports about the llanos and the valley of the Orinoco, and had found, on arriving in these regions, that the temperature said to prevail there had been greatly exaggerated. The same we found to be true of Honda. During our sojourn there, our thermometer never registered more than 86° F. in the shade. Of course, around midday it was uncomfortable in the sun, but I have been in many places in the United States where I suffered more from the heat than I did in Honda.The town is about seven hundred feet above sea level and counts nearly four thousand inhabitants. It is separated into two parts by the river Guali, which here enters the Magdalena. Being the centre of traffic for Bogotá, the upper Magdalena, and the mining district round about Mariquita, it is a place of considerable importance. As soon, however, as the Colombian National Railway, now nearing completion, shall have connected Girardot with Bogotá, Honda will lose the commercial supremacy it has maintained for nearly three centuries. There will then be little reason for a town in this place, and it will lapse into a straggling village similar to many others along the river.And the Muisca Trail, over which we had so delightful a ride, will be no longer needed, and will soon disappear in the dense and rank vegetation through which it passes. Then, too, will disappear those long and picturesque mule-trains, that so often crowded us to the roadside on our way from Bogotá, and which have been almost the sole means employed for the transportation of freight and passengers since the capital was founded by Quesada nearly four centuriesago. We shall always congratulate ourselves that we were able to make the trip on mule-back rather than by a railway train. We can thus feel that we have, to a great extent, seen the country as it was in colonial times—before its character was modified by the innovations of modern progress and the introduction of modern inventions.In 1805 Honda was visited by a terrific earthquake, from the effects of which it has never recovered. Everywhere are evidences of the frightful cataclysm. Some of the largest and most important structures are still in ruins. Nor has any attempt ever been made to restore certain quarters of the town to their prior condition.After a few days’ halt at Honda, we were ready to continue our journey towards the Caribbean. The rapids of the Magdalena make it impracticable for steamers to ascend the river as far as the town. For this reason, it is necessary to go by rail to La Dorada, eighteen miles northwards. But, although the distance is so short, it takes two hours for the train to make the run. The road, however, passes through a picturesque country and time passes pleasantly and quickly. Before one realizes it, one is at La Dorada, where the transfer is made to the steamer bound for Barranquilla.There are several lines of steamboats plying between La Dorada and Barranquilla and intermediate points. But all the boats, which are stern-wheelers, are quite small. The largest of them will not carry more than four hundred tons. Usually the tonnage is much less—not more than one or two hundred tons.2Our boat, which was recommended as the best and the most comfortable on the river, was one of the largest and newest, but, if it was the best, it is difficult to conceive what the others must have been.A glance was sufficient to convince us that the craft on the Magdalena are in every way inferior to those on the Orinoco and its affluents. The Venezuelan boats are larger, and with incomparably better equipment and appointments. They are clean, well kept, and the service is good. Their cabins are commodious and well ventilated. They are, besides, provided with all necessary furniture and the berths are as comfortable as could be desired.But how different is it on the Magdalena boats! In the cabins, in place of berths with neat bedding, there is a bare cot, usually of questionable cleanliness. Each passenger is supposed to supply his own bedding. As to lavatories and bathrooms, those that we saw were filthy beyond description. Our stewards were half-dressed, barefooted, slovenly, unwashed negro boys, who seemed to have been picked up on the streets at random, just before the boat left its moorings. The cuisine and service were in keeping with everything else, and left very much room for improvement. The natives, having nothing better, seemed to be satisfied with the conditions that obtained. The foreigners, however, and there were representatives of several nationalities aboard, could never become reconciled to the lack of so many things essential to comfortable traveling, and were always glad when their river experiences were at an end.For ourselves, who had been roughing it so long, the trip down the river was not so trying as it was for many others. We were, besides, better prepared for such a journey than the other passengers. We had our camping outfits with us, together with clean bedding, which had received the attention of the laundress before we left Bogotá. We had, besides, good cumare hammocks, and mosquito nets, so that we had nothing to apprehend from filth, vermin or insects. Thus equipped, we really enjoyed our voyage on the Magdalena, but we were probably the only ones who did.After we had gotten fairly started down stream, andcould contemplate at our leisure the rich tropical vegetation that fringed both banks, our minds reverted to the first trip made down this river by Europeans. The travelers were the celebrated conquistadores, of whom mention has already been made, viz., Quesada, Belalcazar and Federmann. They embarked with a number of soldiers at Guataqui, a short distance above Honda. But they had scarcely started on their downward course, before they encountered the rapids at the mouth of the Guali. They were then obliged to unload their two brigantines and canoes and transport their contents to the lower part of the cataract, whence, after reloading, they were able to proceed again on their long journey to Cartagena.It was while passing this point that Quesada learned from his Indian boatmen of the existence of gold in the valley of the Guali. In consequence of this information, the town of Marquita was founded without delay, and has ever since been a mining centre of considerable importance. It was in this place that Quesada died after his return from Spain. From here his remains were transferred to the Cathedral of Bogotá, where they still repose.According to Padre Simon, Quesada and his companions were frequently, during their journey down the river, attacked by Indians, “who came out to salute them and speed their way with a shower of poisoned arrows.” “With the help of God,” he continues, “joined to eternal vigilance, their own valor and a liberal supply of powder and firearms with which the soldiers of Belalcazar were provided, they were able finally to arrive at Cartagena, and give the first information regarding the great campaign in which Quesada and his followers had achieved such signal success.”3The Magdalena, like many other water courses in South America, was at first known as the Rio Grande—the great river. It was subsequently given the name it now bearsin honor of St. Mary Magdalene.4At times it is comparatively narrow and deep. Then navigation is easy and without danger. At other times,“Shallow, disreputable, vastIt spreads across the western plains.”Then progress is difficult, and the boat may run into a sand bar at any moment. And if the river should then be falling, it may be impossible to get the craft free until the water rises. Only a short time before our trip one of the steamers had been held in a sand bank for forty days. As it was not near any place where provisions could be obtained, the passengers suffered greatly from hunger, not to speak of the suspense and enforced detention on an uncomfortable boat.Owing to the shallowness of the river, the boat was, during the first part of the voyage, always tied up for the night at the first tree or stump that might be found on the bank at sunset. The following morning we were supposed to resume our journey at daybreak, but, as the firemen did not begin to get up steam before that time, it was usually an hour after sunrise before we were under way. We stopped at every village and warehouse along the river, sometimes to deliver the mail, often consisting of only a single letter or package, or to take on a passenger. Two or three times a day, also, we halted to take on wood to supply the furnace with fuel, for here, as on the Meta, coal is not used. Fortunately, we were never obliged, as on the Meta, to delay until the wood could be cut. Large wood piles are found every few miles all along the river. They usually belong to a negro, who has a hut or shed near by, together with a small garden and a few domestic animals which supply him and his family with food in their sequestered home.We stopped at several large warehouses, many of themconstructed of corrugated iron from the United States. This seems strange in a land where timber is so abundant. But there are no sawmills in the Magdalena valley. South of Barranquilla—where but little lumber is produced—imported lumber would be more expensive and less durable than iron. At these places the chief articles of merchandise are coffee, cacao, hides and vegetable ivory. This last product, also called ivory nuts, is the fruit of a species of palm known asPhytelephas macrocarpa,5and constitutes, in this part of Colombia, an important article of commerce. For many things it is a good substitute for elephant ivory, which it rivals in whiteness, beauty and solidity, and collecting it for shipment gives occupation to quite a number of the poor inhabitants of the Magdalena valley.We usually went ashore at the different landing places to see the people and familiarize ourselves with their mode of life. It was generally as simple and primitive as possible—almost as primitive, in some instances, as we conceive it to have been in the Quaternary period or in the days of the Troglodytes. Often their dwellings were little more than palm-thatched sheds—barely sufficient to shield their occupants from sun and rain. Atulpa, consisting of three stones, served them in lieu of a stove, and on this they broiled the fish caught in the river, or prepared theirarepas—corn cakes—or theirsancocho, a kind of ragout, as popular in some parts of Colombia as it is in Venezuela.We were surprised to see in the houses and shops along the Magdalena valley—what we had often observed in various parts of Colombia and Venezuela—the large number of illustrated circulars of Spanish, English and French proprietary medicines. The insides of certain houses were sometimes quite plastered over with them. But what was more surprising was the number of lithographs we saw ofthe German Emperor. Sometimes he was represented alone, at others he was depicted as surrounded by the members of his family. In several places we saw pictures not only of the emperor and his family, but also those of his father and grandfather and Bismarck. And the remarkable thing about it was that, in some cases, there were no Germans living within hundreds of miles of where we came across these pictures. Had some enthusiastic Teuton tried to start a propaganda in favor of the Vaterland by distributing broadcast these engravings of the imperial family? I know not, but, judging solely from the number of their pictures we came across in Venezuela and Colombia, one would be led to suppose that the Hohenzollern rulers are the most popular of potentates, at least in this part of South America.While stopping to take on some rubber at a certain small village, we had a remarkable illustration of the rapidity with which the bed of the river is sometimes changed, even when the water is comparatively low. We had scarcely reached the landing place when there was a terrific crash, occasioned by the falling in of a large section of the bank on which the village was built. Soon afterwards another section gave way, and then a third and a fourth. The whole bank seemed to be undermined by the river, and, although the warehouse was fully fifty feet away from the water when we arrived, so much of the bank had been carried away in less than half an hour, that not only the contents of the building, but also the building itself had to be hurriedly removed in order that it and the merchandise stored within might not be borne away by the resistless current. As the structure was of light bamboo, and put together with a view to such an emergency, the transfer was not a difficult task. When we started to continue our course, it looked as if the eroding action of the river would necessitate the changing of the site of the entire village before nightfall.Such changes in the course of the river are not uncommon.They are going on all the time in some part or other of the valley. One may frequently see immense masses of earth suddenly detached, which are a serious menace to the champans6—large covered flat-boats—and other small craft that happen to pass by at the time. Sometimes the giants of the forest are thus wrested from their footholds, and may be seen drifting down stream together with masses of vegetation attached to them. At times, too, masses of earth, like floating islets, are visible, and may travel a long distance down stream before their course is arrested by an island or a sand bar.Ordinarily the changes in the river bed are gradual and occasion little danger to life or property. Sometimes, however, during the rainy season, and when the flood is unusually high, widespread devastation is the result. Whole villages are swept away by the deluge; and towns, that were before important commercial centres, are suddenly isolated and left far from the navigable part of the river. Places that before were favorably situated are, after the flood, found to be in the midst of pestiferous morasses. Such has been the fate of many places along the waterways of Colombia, but more notably in the great island of Mompos, near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena. Here several places that were at onetime centres of industrial and agricultural activity, have long since either ceased to exist or lost entirely their pristine importance.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.The town of Mompos is probably the most remarkable example of this kind. Founded in 1539 by Alonso de Heredia, it is one of the oldest towns in the republic, and was for generations the most important commercial centre between Cartagena and Honda. But owing to a displacement of the main channel of the river, and the filling in of the branch of the river on which the town was built, it is now practically deprived of its former means of communication with the rest of the country, and is rapidly verging towards extinction.The Magdalena, as a commercial highway, has been much neglected. As a consequence, no one can calculate when leaving Honda, how long it will take him to reach Barranquilla. It may require five or six days, or it may demand twice that much time. All depends on the shifting bed of the river, or the blocking of the channel by sand bars and accumulations of floating timber. By reason of these obstructions and the ever-varying depth of the main channel, navigation is usually impossible at night, except below the island of Mompos, where the volume of water is swelled by the tribute of the mighty Cauca.If the Magdalena were under the supervision of a corps of competent engineers, having at their disposal the necessary dredges and other appliances for keeping the main channel in prime condition, a properly constructed boat would easily make the trip from Honda to the mouth of the river in two days, and traverse the same course up stream in three days at most. It is really a pity to see such a splendid water course so neglected. If cared for as it should be, it could easily be rendered an artery for inland commerce of the first importance. As it is, transportation, as now carried on, is always slow and uncertain, and never free from danger and disaster.As a serviceable means of communication with the outside world we were constantly contrasting the Magdalena with the Meta. From our observations, we should consider the Meta, from its junction with the Orinoco to Cabuyaro or even to the mouth of the Humea, as a safer waterway than the Magdalena. Only twice did our boat graze a sand bank in the Meta, but it continued its course without a moment’s stoppage. In the Magdalena, however, we frequently ran into sand bars, or shallow water, and, on several occasions, had difficulty in extricating and floating our craft. Once we were delayed for some time, and began to fear that, owing to the falling water, we should be stranded for weeks, as other boats had been not long before.When peace shall have been firmly established in Colombia, and its finances shall have been placed on a satisfactory basis, the patriotic and far-seeing statesmen of the republic, will, I am convinced, see the necessity of carrying out the plan of the former Archbishop and Viceroy of New Granada—Don Antonio Caballero y Gongora—and connecting Bogotá with Europe by means of the Meta and the Orinoco. It will not be a difficult feat of engineering to build a railroad from the capital to a suitable point on the Meta, and the length of such a road need not exceed one hundred and fifty miles at most. This will bring Bogatá within eight or ten hours of the head waters of navigation, and develop the most valuable and most productive grazing section of the country.The highest point the road need reach in crossing the Eastern Cordilleras will be less than that of several passes in Colorado, where the Rocky Mountains are scaled by the iron-horse with a long train of cargo behind him. The pass of Chipaque, by which we entered thealtiplaniciesof Bogotá, is several thousand feet lower than the heights crossed by the railways leading from the waters of the Pacific to Lake Titicaca, and to Argentina by way of Cumbre Pass, and is nearly a mile lower than the pointwhere the Galera tunnel pierces the Cordillera on the way from Lima to Oroya.7What Colombia really needs is the betterment of both its great waterways—the Meta for the eastern and the Magdalena for the western part of the republic. Until they shall both have been put in such condition as to be navigable during the entire year, it will be impossible fully to develop the marvelous resources of this extensive country. River traffic will always remain cheaper than traffic by rail, and, on account of many physical difficulties, it is highly improbable that certain valuable sections of territory will ever be tapped by railroads. When, however, these two main arteries of commerce shall have received the attention they deserve and shall have been put in communication with the rich grazing, mining and agricultural regions by the various lines of railway that are contemplated or in course of construction, Colombia will at once take a position among the richest and most flourishing republics of South America. Only those who have traveled through it can fully realize its wonderful natural riches, or form an adequate conception of its vast extent. Sufficient to state that its area is more than ten times as great as the state of New York, or as great as that of France, Germany and the British Isles combined.As to the great Pan-American line which has been projected to connect New York with Buenos Ayres, that is talked of in Colombia as well as in the United States. But when one contemplates the enormous engineering difficulties to be encountered in the construction of the section extending from Costa Rica to the frontier of Ecuador, one is compelled to regard the project as a much more arduous undertaking than some of its enthusiastic promoters would have us believe. Railway communication will soon be completefrom Buenos Ayres to Central Peru, and, judging by work now being accomplished in Ecuador, steel rails will soon span the country from the northern to the southern boundaries of this republic. But with all this work completed, the most difficult part of the colossal enterprise will still remain untouched. Even should the road eventually be completed, as is possible, it is still doubtful whether long stretches of it would ever pay even a nominal interest on the investment.The part of the Magdalena valley between Honda and the island of Mompos is but sparsely inhabited. Most of the inhabitants are Indians, mestizos, or negroes, the descendants of former slaves.8On account of the heat and malaria that always prevail in the lowlands, but few white men are found here, and their sojourn, as a rule, is only temporary. But near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena, and thence to the Caribbean, there are rich and extensiveesteros—grazing lands—covered with succulent Para and Guinea grasses, several feet high. In these broad plains, there are no fewer than half a million cattle, not to speak of large numbers of horses, mules and other domestic animals. Some of the cattle we saw reminded us of the fat, sleek animals we had seen on the llanos watered by the Rio Negro and the Humea. Under more favorable conditions the number could greatly be increased.The scenery along the Magdalena is much like that along the Meta and the Orinoco, except that along the western river one sees more of the mountains, especially in the southern part. The vegetation is similar in character and quite as varied and exuberant. On both sides of the river trees and bushes are so massed together as toform an impenetrable wall. Everywhere there is a veritable maze of creeping plants, of bromelias, bignonias, passifloras. And everywhere, too, are lianas—aptly named monkey-ladders—which bind tree to tree and branch to branch. Usually they are single, like ropes—whence their name bush ropes—but often they are twined together like strands in a cable. Frequently they are seen descending from the topmost part of a tree to the ground, where they forthwith strike root and present the appearance of the stays and shrouds of a ship’s main mast. And where there is air and sunshine, these lianas, which often form bights like ropes, are loaded with epiphytes of all kinds, and decorated with the rarest and most beautiful orchids. Indeed, the regions on both sides of the Magdalena have long been favorite resorts for the orchid hunters in the employ of the florists and merchant princes of the United States and Europe. From here these bizarre vegetable forms are shipped by thousands. One enthusiastic English collector tells us how he secured, as the result of two months’ work about ten thousand plants of the highly prizedOdontoglossum. But to obtain these orchids he was obliged to fell some four thousand trees.“The most magnificent sight,” he writes, “for even the most stoical observer, is the immense clumps ofCattleya Mendelii, each new bulb bearing four or five of its gorgeous rose-colored flowers, many of them growing in the full sun, or with very little shade, and possessing a glowing color which is very difficult to get in the stuffy hothouses where the plants are cultivated. Some of these plants, considering their size and the slowness of growth, must have taken many years to develop, for I have taken plants from the trees with five hundred bulbs, and as many as one hundred spikes of flowers, which, to a lover of orchids, is a sight worth traveling from Europe to see.”9It is when contemplating the marvelous variety andluxuriance of intertropical flora—of which one in our northern climes can have no adequate conception—that one is tempted to exclaim with Wordsworth:—“It is my faith, that every flowerEnjoys the air it breathes.”10And if the extraordinary claims which Professors Wagner, France and G. H. Darwin make for plants be true, viz., that they have minds and are conscious of their existence, that they feel pain and have memories, then, indeed, should we be disposed to regard the exuberant and wondrously developed plants of the equatorial world as occupying the highest plane in the evolutionary process of vegetable life.Passing the embouchure of the Opon, on the right bank of the Magdalena, evoked, in a special manner, memories of Quesada and his valiant band. It was here they left the Magdalena during that memorable expedition that made them the undisputed masters of the country now known as Colombia. More than eight months had passed since they had started from Santa Marta on their career of discovery and conquest. The difficulties they had to encounter and the sufferings they had to endure were extreme. Mosquitoes, wasps, ants and other insects; reptiles and jaguars gave them no rest, day or night. Certain kinds of worms, the old chroniclers tell us, buried themselves in the flesh of the exhausted and half-famished men and caused them untold agony. Indians everywhere laid ambush for them, and assailed them with poisoned arrows from every point of vantage. Even the elements seemed to conspire against them. There was a continual downpour of rain, so that it was impossible to light a fire for any purpose. Their arms were almost destroyed by rust, and they were left withouta single dry charge of powder. Their provisions became exhausted and starvation stared them in the face. To preserve life they devoured their sword scabbards and every article of leather they had with them. There was incessant thunder, unchanging gloom, eternal horror, and other features of the pit infernal. Their course was through dense underbrush and pestiferous swamps and up precipitous acclivities, whither they had to drag their weakened horses by long lianas that served the purpose of ropes.11Finally, after the most heroic efforts, they came to a place where they found provisions—a veritable land of promise for the suffering but intrepid Spaniards. They had left behind them the inhospitable sierras of the Opon, and were on the verge of the fertile plateau of Cundinamarca, that constituted the home of the Muiscas. Here they found maize, potatoes,12yucas, beans, tomatoes and, as Padre Simon phrases it, “a thousand otherchucherias—titbits—of the aborigines.” Well could they, in the language of Castellanos, exclaim, with thanksgiving:“A good land! A good land! A land which puts an end to our suffering, a land of gold, a land of plenty. A land for a home, a land of benediction, bright and serene.”It was then that the enthusiastic soldiers, whose courage would often have faltered, had it not been for the determination and perseverance of their invincible leader, gathered around Quesada to congratulate him on the successful issueof his great undertaking, and to assure him of their undying loyalty in any future enterprise in which he might require their services.And well they might render the noble licentiate the meed of praise he so well deserved, for had it not been for him, the expedition would have been a failure, and they would undoubtedly have perished before they could have returned to Santa Marta, as had so many of their companions, who had turned back before the ascent of the Cordillera was begun. To some of his officers who, in view of the unheard-of difficulties they had to encounter, recommended that the expedition be abandoned, he replied that he would regard as a personal enemy any one who, in future, would make such a pusillanimous proposal and one so foreign to Spanish valor.All in all, he was one of the bravest and most humane of the conquistadores, and successfully performed a task before which a less valorous commander would have given up in despair. His achievements obscure by their brilliancy and daring those of Amadis and Roldan and are in no wise inferior to those of any of the conquistadores. They may truthfully, in the words of Bacon, written anent a performance of Sir Richard Grenville, be styled as “memorable beyond credit, and to the height of some heroical fable.”Quesada has taken his place in Valhalla among the greatest of the world’s heroes, and his memory will endure as long as splendid deeds of prowess shall stir the souls of men. Of him and his gallant companions one can say what Peter Martyr wrote of their countrymen in general:—“Wherefore, the Spanyardes in these owre dayes and theyr noble enterpryses, doo not gyue place eyther to the factes of Saturnus, or Hercules, or any other of the ancient princes of famous memorie, which werecanonizedamonge the goddes cauled Heroes for theyr searchinge of newe landes, and regions, and bringinge the same to better culture and ciuilitie.”13Lower down the Magdalena, on the left bank of the river, we approached the scene of the exploits of another of the distinguished conquistadores—Pedro de Heredia, the founder of Cartagena. After he had reduced to submission the Indians who had been victorious over Ojeda, he started towards the Magdalena, where he collected such immense treasures of gold that when it was divided, each soldier received no less than 6,000 ducats. This was the equivalent of $48,000 in gold at the present valuation of this metal, and was the largest apportionment of spoil, at least, so far as private soldiers were concerned, made during the conquest.14He afterwards made a similar expedition to the territories drained by the San Jorge and the Nechi, affluents of the Cauca, in search of the rich veins whence the Indians extracted their gold. He did not find the objects of his quest, but came across several rich cemeteries, in which the dead had been interred with their jewels, and a sanctuary with idols adorned with plates of gold. From these he secured treasures to the amount of more than $3,000,000 of our money.15Strange as it may seem, the method Heredia resorted to of securing gold, the rifling of thehuacas—burial places—of the aborigines, has been continued until the present day. There are still men in Colombia, notably in Antioquia—huaqueros, they are called—who gain a livelihood by searching for huacas and extracting from them the gold and emeralds they frequently contain.The year before our trip there appeared in an English magazine, the following paragraph in an article purporting to give a picture of the Magdalena valley and its life:—“Anchored in the forest at midnight, the traveler hearsthe deep growl of the jaguar, the sharp squeal of the wild cat, the howl of the howler monkey, the long moan of the sloth, and the last scream of the wild pig, pierced by the claws of some patient but ferocious animal ambushed during the past hour, with many other sounds of life, terror and conflict that fall strangely on the European ear, and, if he waits and watches until the dawn, he may see the alligator dragging his ugly bulk out of the water, crowds of turtles trailing on the sands, the deer and the tapir coming down to drink, thousands of white cranes on the branches nearest to their prey, thousands of gray ones already wading leg-deep, and many more thousands of other birds clouding the dim horizon, all waiting for the light ere they begin their work of life and slaughter.... With the alligators in shoals at the bottom of the river, and the millions of birds above its surface, one wonders how any fish are left, yet the river is always literally teeming with fish, as though conscious of the demands it has to meet.”Although we were always on the alert, so as to miss nothing of interest, especially anything that concerned the animal life of the tropics, we must confess that in all our experience we never heard growls, squeals, howls, moans, screams, or other sounds of terror and conflict, either along the Magdalena or anywhere else in South America. And we spent nearly a year in the country, and often traveled weeks at a time in the wild virgin forest, far away from human habitations of every kind. Nor did we ever perceive any of the animals that certain tourists would lead one to believe can be seen in such numbers everywhere, even from the deck of a passing steamer. Nowhere along the Orinoco, the Meta, the Magdalena, or elsewhere, did we ever catch even a glimpse of a jaguar or a puma, a manati or a sloth, a wild cat or a wild pig. More than this, not once, during our entire trip through Venezuela and Colombia, through forests and plains, did we ever see a single monkey, except two or three that were kept as petsby the natives. This may seem an incredible statement. I would have believed such an experience as ours to be absolutely impossible, especially in view of what writers and travelers in South America have told us regarding the immense number of wild animals of all kinds everywhere visible in equatorial wilds. But I am stating a fact that I am quite unable to reconcile with the contrary experiences of others who, according to their own admission, have seen but little, compared with what we saw, of the lands through which we passed. I have seen more large game on the plains of New Mexico and Wyoming, from the window of a Pullman car, in a single trip to and from the Pacific coast, than I ever saw in the wilds of South America during nearly a twelvemonth.Nor did we ever see along the Magdalena, or anywhere else, the “thousands of white cranes on branches,” nor the “thousands of gray ones wading leg-deep,” nor the “many more thousands clouding the dim horizon,” of which the writer of the above-mentioned article professes to have been the fortunate spectator. We rarely saw more than a few dozen cranes at a time—never a hundred, and I have reason to believe we enjoyed very favorable opportunities, at least during a portion of our long journey, for seeing what was to be seen. At no time did we ever observe as many birds in the air at one time as I have frequently seen in the United States. I feel safe in asserting positively that the number of wild pigeons I have frequently noted in a single flock in the United States, would more than equal that of all the birds combined that we saw while in the tropics.Mr. F. Lorraine Petre evidently had an experience somewhat similar to ours. In his recent work on Colombia, he tells us frankly that one sees little of animal life on the Magdalena, that “of the mammalia one sees and hears little.... Of the jaguars, the pumas, the sloths, the peccaries, the deer, the tapirs, and other animals, dangerous or harmless, we saw or heard as little as we did of the bears which inhabit the hills beyond. It is surprisingthat, tied up, as we often were, right against the forest, we should not have heard the night call of the carnivora, or the sharp bark of the frightened deer, but truth compels us to admit that we did not, and, moreover, that the cry of even the howling monkey did not salute us.”16The number of birds observed along the Magdalena was not greater than I have frequently seen in the valleys of the Missouri or the Columbia. Most of these were parrots and macaws. Always noisy and restless, always flying and climbing about, except when eating fruit or cracking nuts, one is at times tempted to describe them as feathered relatives of the monkey. The parrots are sometimes seen in flocks, and their piercing cries are at times almost deafening. They are a sociable bird and are usually seen in considerable numbers. The macaws are remarkable for always flying in pairs, and for their brilliant colors. Their body is flaming scarlet, their wings are tinged with various shades of red, yellow, green and blue, while their tail is bright blue and scarlet. They, too, like parrots, are very vociferous, and, although they may occasionally be found in large numbers, they always fly two and two.The large animals most frequently seen along the Magdalena, as along other tropical rivers, are those horrid monsters, “ambiguous between sea and land,” the cayman and “the scaly crocodile.” But even they are not so numerous as certain travelers would have us believe. The largest number we ever saw at one time was fifteen. They were sunning themselves on aplaya—sand bank—below the island of Mompos. On the Orinoco and the Meta we never beheld more than eight at any one time—unless wewere to count a number of little ones, just hatched, which Luisito, our colored boy, caught one day while we were taking on wood on the lower Meta.17The early Spaniards called all these saurians by the general name oflagartos—lizards. The English afterwards spoke of a single animal as a lagarto, whence the present name alligator. Modern writers speak of them indiscriminately as alligators or crocodiles. As a matter of fact, several species of both alligators and crocodiles are found in the equatorial regions. But, notwithstanding all that has hitherto been written about them, their distinction and definition, their classification still remains a matter of difficulty. Some specimens have been found whose classification is so perplexing that naturalists are still undecided whether to regard them as crocodiles or alligators. In this respect they are much like Shakespeare’s two lovers, “Two distincts, division none.”The name cayman is employed in Venezuela and Colombia to designate any of these saurians. Following the classification adopted in the British Museum the cayman is distinct from both alligator and crocodile. More than this. According to the British system of classification, there are no alligators at all in South America, while, in the waters of Colombia and Venezuela, there are two species of crocodile and three species of cayman.Probably more fabulous accounts have obtained about crocodiles than about any other animal. In spite of the old saying to the contrary, they never shed tears. And notwithstanding the fact that the ancient Egyptians gave the crocodile divine honors, because, being tongueless, it wasmade in hieroglyphical writing, a symbol of the Divinity, it is now known that the tongue of this erstwhile god is quite large, except at the tip. Similarly, all the stories that have so long been current about the impenetrability of the animal’s hide, are quite without foundation. How often have we not been told that it is impossible to kill a crocodile, with even the best Winchester, unless the ball enter the eye or strike under the soft, fleshy parts of the front legs? Their plated skin is easily pierced by an ordinary rifle or revolver, and a mortal wound ensues whenever a vital part is penetrated.Not less erroneous are the ideas that so widely prevail regarding the ferocity of the crocodile and the cayman. On the contrary, they are, in their native state, very timid animals, and rarely exhibit hostility towards man, except when cornered. Then, like most other animals, they will fight with great fierceness. They make for the water as soon as they see one approach them, and it is often far from easy to get near them. We often saw the natives enter rivers frequented by crocodiles and caymans, something they surely would not have done if the danger were as great as ordinarily imagined. In Venezuela the Indian or mestizo has a much greater dread of the ray or carib fish than of the cayman.18Some attempts have been made, both on the Orinoco and the Magdalena, to secure the hides of crocodiles and caymans for commercial purposes, but the expense of preparing them for the market proved to be so great that the work had to be abandoned.19The early explorers of the New World had many stories to tell about the cayman and the crocodile, and many of them have apparently survived among the natives until the present day. But there were many other animals that made even a greater impression on them. It will suffice to reproduce Peter Martyr’s quaint account of two of these representatives of the American fauna. The first is the tapir, of which he writes as follows:—“But there is especially one beast engendered here, in which nature hath endeuoured to shew her cunnyng. This beaste is as bygge as an oxe, armed with a longe snoute lyke an elephant, and yet no elephant. Of the colour of an oxe and yet noo oxe. With the houfe of a horse, and yet noo horse. With eares also much lyke vnto an elephant, but not soo open nor soo much hangying downe: yet much wyder then the eares of any other beaste.”20The other animal that excited the wonder of Martyr and his contemporaries was the sloth, of which he says:— “Emonge these trees is fownde that monstrous beaste with a snowte lyke a foxe, a tayle lyke a marmasette, eares lyke a batte, handes lyke a man, and feete lyke an ape, bearing her whelpes abowte with her in an owtwarde bellye much lyke vnto a greate bagge or purse. The dead carkas of this beaste, you sawe with me, and turned it ouer and ouer with yowre owne handes, marueylynge at that newe belly and wonderful prouision of nature. They say it is knownen by experience, that shee neuer letteth her whelpes goo owte of that purse, except it be eyther to play, or to sucke, vntyl suche tyme that they bee able to gette theyr lyuing by them selues.”21The part of the valley below the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena was quite different from that above. The country contained more inhabitants, and the denseforests that had hitherto bordered the river gave place to broad savannas, on which grazed thousands of cattle, so buried in the Para and Guinea grasses, that frequently we could discern only their horns. Along the river banks were the estates of well-to-dohaciendados—some of them foreigners—and the villages, that before were extremely rare, became more numerous. The aspect of the country was less wild than that through which we had just passed, and betokened a certain measure of prosperity, at least so far as the grazing interests were concerned.We could now travel day and night, for the river was so deep that sand bars were no longer to be apprehended. And then we had the most delightful moonlight nights. The air was balmy and laden with an exquisite fragrance,“Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,”a constant invitation to repose anddolce far niente. The surpassing loveliness of the scene, the magic stillness of the vast solitude through which we were so peacefully gliding, the broad expanse of one of the world’s great rivers, the weird silhouettes cast by the passing palms on the moonlit waters—all these things contributed towards rendering our last night on the river a fitting finale to the others—all of which were in the highest degree enjoyable. Seated on the forward deck of our steamer, we could exclaim in the words of the choric song of Tennyson’sLotos-Eaters:—“How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,With half-shut eyes ever to seemFalling asleep in a half-dream!Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.”The following morning—our last day on the Magdalena—found us at Calamar. Here some of our fellow-passengers disembarked to take the train to Cartagena, sixty-five miles to the westward. From Calamar to Barranquilla,the chief northern terminus of river navigation, is sixty-six miles. This distance we expected to make in a few hours, but for reasons presently to be given, we were unexpectedly delayed within sight of Barranquilla, the goal that marked the completion of another important stage in our journey.Our last day on the Magdalena was a bright balmy one in June. We spent the entire time on the forward part of the upper deck, fanned by the delightful breezes that were wafted from the Caribbean. The river here has about the same width as has the Mississippi at New Orleans, but the scenery is far more attractive. It flows through a broad, level, grass-covered savanna, which extends beyond the limits of vision, and which is dotted here and there with small villages and flourishing haciendas. Some of the houses near the river banks have a most cozy appearance. They are almost embowered in a mass of flowers of every hue, and surrounded by lofty palms whose lovely emerald coronals were each a picture of rarest beauty.“These princes of the vegetable world” always had a peculiar fascination for us, no matter where we saw them. And during our long journey from the delta of the Orinoco they were never absent from view even for a single hour. When one species disappeared it was replaced by another, and thus they followed us from the Atlantic wave to the lofty crest of Suma Paz. The ocean-loving cocoa gave place to the moriche, and this was in turn succeeded by the corneto of the llanos and the wax palm of the Sierras.22It is quite impossible for the inhabitants of our northern climes to have anything approaching an adequate conception of the grace and beauty and surpassing loveliness of the omnipresent palms of the equatorial world. Awayfrom heat and sunshine, they are quite devoid of the luxuriance and stateliness that characterize them in the tropics. In Europe, for instance, there is but a single palm that is indigenous—theChamærops humilis. The date palm was introduced from the East. In the tropics, however, about eleven hundred species of palms are known, and there is reason to believe that, when this part of the world shall have been thoroughly explored, many new species shall be discovered.The habits as well as the habitats of palms were a source of unfailing interest to us. Some are solitary and are rarely found forming groups with other trees of their species. Others, like the date palm, are quite gregarious and often form extensive clumps. Others still are said to be “social,” because they occupy extensive tracts almost to the entire exclusion of other kinds of trees. Various species ofMauritia,Attalea,CocoaandCoperniciaare social palms, and thepalmares—palm groves—formed by them constitute the most attractive features of tropical landscapes.We once saw near the river’s bank a grove of this kind composed of palms of unusual height and beauty. It had been selected as the last resting place of the denizens of a neighboring village, and was, to our mind, the most beautiful cemetery in the world. Could we have our choice, we should prefer, by far, to repose under one of those noble frond-bearing shafts to being shelved away in the costliest marble vault of Père Lachaise.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.Certain palms affect the open savanna, others seek the solitudes of the forest, while still others are most frequently found midway between these two—that is, on the belt of land that separates forest from plain. Some palms, like the cocoa, seem to require an atmosphere that is slightly saline, and thrive best near the ocean’s shore. Others apparently attain their greatest development in marshes and lowlands, while others again demand the arid plain or the lofty mountain plateau.In spite of their noble appearance and their aspect of perennial youth, palms, as a rule, are short-lived. None of them ever attain the age of the venerable patriarchs of our northern forests. According to Martius, the span of a palm’s life never exceeds that of a few generations of men. The areca catechu runs its course in forty or fifty years, the cocoa attains an age of one hundred or one hundred and twenty years at most, while the date palm, which probably lives the longest, usually rounds out its existence within the period of two centuries.Some palms, like theMetroxylon, for instance, never survive fructification. It fruits but once, and then, as Martius so graphically expresses it, “nobilis arbor mox riget, perit et cadit”—the noble tree presently withers, perishes and falls. But, continues the same writer, “there is pleasure and solace in the thought that palms never die without yielding fruit, thereby insuring the continuance of the species.” And then, as is his wont when opportunity offers, he takes occasion from this circumstance to moralize as follows: “To labor, to flourish, to fructify is granted not only to the palm but to man also.”23In the foregoing pages I have mentioned some of the countless uses made of palms, especially by the inhabitants of the tropics. It would, however, require a large volume to enumerate all the purposes for which they are employed. It can, however, safely be asserted that no family in the great vegetable kingdom more completely meets the necessities of millions of people than does that of the noble and ever-beautiful Palmaceæ.Like Martius, we always found in the contemplation of the palm a source of special joy and peace. To him the palm was what literature was to Cicero, a consolation in trial and affliction, and the delight and inspiration of maturer years. In the palm we always found something to elevate the mind, something that fascinated us and stirred our emotions in a manner that often surprised us. For us,as for myriads of others who have lived and struggled and attained the goal of the heart’s desire, the palm was the emblem of victory, of a higher and better life beyond the tomb, of a happy, glorious immortality.As we gazed in silent delight at the broad expanse of the green-carpeted savanna, adorned with the graceful, columnar shafts and feathery fronds of the ever-beautiful, ever-majestic palm, we could easily fancy ourselves in the valley of the Euphrates or in the plains of Babylon, as described by Herodotus and Xenophon. And, without any effort of the imagination, we could descry, in a palm-shaded village in the vista before us, Jericho, as Moses saw it, when the Land of Promise was a land of palms, as well as a land of milk and honey, and when Judea was so prolific in palms that one of its representatives was chosen as the symbol of the country.24We dreamed of Zenobia’s fair capital, Palmyra—the city of Palms—of the land of the Nile, where Isis and Osiris carried palms as the symbol of their fecund power. We recalled the enthusiastic words of the ancient poets—Hebrew and Greek—in praise of the gracefulness and magnificence of the palm, and the plaintive elegy of Abdul Rhaman, first calif of Cordoba, who, exiled from Damascus, his home, thus addresses the date palm, that reminds him of the land of his birth: “Thou, also, beautiful palm, art here a stranger. The sweet zephyr of Algaraba descends and caresses thy beauty. Thou growest in this fertile soil and raisest thy crown to the skies. What bitter tears thou would’st shed, if, like me, thou hadst feeling!”25While thus musing on the glories of the past and contemplating the splendors of the present, which were passing in rapid succession before our enchanted vision, we instinctively repeated the words of the reverent poet-naturalist,Martius, who, contemplating the marvels of the tropical palm-world, expressed the depth of his emotion by the two words,Sursum corda—hearts heavenward!Just then our reveries were suddenly and unexpectedly interrupted.We had, early in the day, been congratulating ourselves on making our voyage down the river without delay and without accident. We were now within sight of Barranquilla and expected to land in less than an hour. We were in the full enjoyment of one of those delightful day-dreams that we always loved to indulge in, whenever Flora displayed before us, as she did then, her choicest treasures, when suddenly, without premonition of any kind, there was a violent lurch of the boat, a creaking and a crushing noise abaft, a quick stoppage of the engine, all of which indicated that something unusual, if not serious, had befallen our ill-fated craft. A hasty examination showed that the steamer had collided with a sunken tree, and that several of the float-boards of the stern-wheel had been loosened, or partially wrenched from their places. After considerable delay the boatmen were able so to repair the damage that we were able to continue on our journey, although at a reduced speed.Very shortly afterwards there was a second and a much severer crash. We had encountered another hidden tree. This time several of the float-boards were carried away from the wheel entirely, and the wheel itself was so racked that repair, while on the river, was quite impossible. Fortunately, as we were going down stream, we were able to float to the entrance of the canal that leads to the docks of Barranquilla. Here a crowd of stevedores from the town soon congregated. These men, mostly negroes, agreed, after some parleying, to haul the boat to the landing place. They, accordingly, took hold of a long rope, which was thrown ashore, and soon the disabled steamer was being conveyed to her moorings in the same fashion as a canal boat is drawn along by mules in tandem. Wereached the wharf the fifth day26after leaving Honda, just as the sun was setting, and when the customs officers were about to close their office for the night. They, however, kindly allowed us to disembark and we were soon on our way to a hotel.“How fortunate,” C. exclaimed, “that this accident did not occur midway up the river!” Such a mishap would have entailed much suffering and might have delayed our arrival at Barranquilla, for days, if not for weeks. And considering our happy escape from the detentions and disasters from which so many others had suffered, and the peculiar episode that characterized our last hours on the Magdalena, we were forcibly reminded of the words of Dante:—“Let not the people be too swift to judge.For I have seenA bark, that all her way across the seaRan straight and speedy, perish at the lastE’en in the haven’s mouth.”271“Hail, hail, majestic river!... Contemplating thee, adorned by the eldest of Earth’s sons; full only of thee, I feel my soul carried on by the foam of thy waves, which in deep whirlpools roar, absorbed in the giant works of that Being which embraces the infinite.”↑2The reader will be surprised to learn that the aggregate capacity of all the boats—champans included—at present plying on the Magdalena—proudly named by the people the Danube of Colombia—is not more than eleven thousand tons, about half the tonnage of one of our great transatlantic steamers.↑3Op. cit., 3a Noticia, Cap. IX.↑4The first mention, apparently, of the Magdalena, as distinguished from the Rio Grande, occurs in Benzoni’s work, already cited.↑5Called by the nativesCabeza de Negro—Negro-head—from the globular form of the spathe enclosing the nuts.↑6The introduction of the steamboat on the Magdalena will soon suppress the rude yet picturesque craft known as the champan. With it will disappear that interesting type of negro known as theboga. The boga is tall and robust, with the habits of a savage. He spends the greater part of his time in the champan, and his life as a punter is a strenuous one and full of danger. He speaks a barbarous jargon—currulao—composed of Spanish and of certain African and Indian dialects. His ideas of honor and honesty are not unlike those of similar people in other parts of the world. One can safely trust him with money and clothing, but, if the traveler have liquor of any kind with him, the boga will be sure to purloin it at the first opportunity. He is simple, frank, and brave. He sings during good weather, even while struggling against the current or fighting caymans, but he swears like a trooper during rain and thunder storms, especially when the lightning strikes near him. For him death is a very simple matter. A dead man to him is like a champan damaged beyond repair—something to be carried away by the all-devouring river.↑7The exact altitudes of the points named are as follows:—Cumbre Pass, between Chile and Argentina, 12,505 feet; Crucero Alto, between Arequipa and Lake Titicaca, 14,666 feet; Galera Tunnel, 15,665 feet. At Urbina, on the recently-completed railroad between Guayaquil and Quito, the height above sea level is 11,841 feet.↑8In Colombia, the white race, composed of the descendants of the conquistadores, most of whom have intermarried with the indigenous tribes, constitutes fifty per cent of the population. The negroes compose thirty-five and the Indians fifteen per cent. In Venezuela the descendants of Europeans are in the minority, while in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia the indigenes make up nearly two-thirds of the inhabitants.La Republique de Colombie, p. 44, par Ricardo Nuñez et Henry Jalahay, Bruxelles, 1898.↑9Albert Millican,Travels and Adventures of an Orchid Hunter, p. 118, London, 1891.↑10The noted English botanist, Spruce, expresses a similar idea when he writes, “I like to look on plants as sentient beings, which live and enjoy their lives—which beautify the earth during life, and after death may adorn my herbarium.”—Notes of a Botanist, and the Amazon and Andes, Chap. XXXIX, by Richard Spruce, London, 1908.↑11The route followed by Quesada from the Magdalena to the plateau of Bogotá has remained impassable for horses since the time of the conquest. To one familiar with the difficulties of the way, it seems impossible that so small a body of soldiers should ever have been able to take sixty horses with them and bring them all, with a single exception, in safety to the plains above. It may be safely doubted if such a feat could be accomplished now. But “there were giants in those days.”↑12The fact that the Spaniards found potatoes here on their arrival, and the further fact that there was never any communication, so far as known, between New Granada and Chile before the conquest, would seem to indicate that theSolanum tuberosummay have been, contrary to the opinion of Humboldt and De Candolle, indigenous to Colombia.↑13Op. cit., Dec. I, Book X.↑14Quesada’s infantry received as their share of the spoil, which had been secured, the equivalent of about $1,000. The cavalry received twice this amount.↑15In the province of Sinu the amount of treasure in gold and jewels secured in one day amounted to $300,000. Not without reason, then, was this part of the New World designated by the early geographers,Castilla del Oro—Golden Castile.↑16The Republic of Colombia, p. 59, London, 1906.Nothing is farther from my mind than to call in question the veracity of distinguished naturalists and travelers regarding any statements they may have made concerning the vast numbers of animals and birds seen by them in the equinoctial regions of South America. But my experience proves at least one thing and that is that one may travel a long time in the very heart of the tropics, and see very little of its fauna, even in those parts in which it is generally supposed that there are always representatives of many kinds and that, too, in great numbers.↑17The following sentence affords an interesting commentary on the occasional rarity of certain animals which are usually supposed to be always visible in large numbers, especially in the Magdalena.“I have read much of the number of alligators on the Magdalena, but have not seen one.”—The Journal of an Expedition Across Venezuela and Colombia, p. 264, 1906–7, by Hiram Bingham, New Haven. 1909.Raleigh says he saw in Guiana thousands of these “vglie serpants” calledLagartos.↑18Mr. R. L. Ditmars, Curator of Reptiles in the New York Zoological Park, in his interesting work,The Reptile Book, writes as follows of the crocodile: “The sight of a child will send a twelve-foot specimen rushing from its basking place for the water, and a man may even bathe in safety in rivers frequented by the species. The dangerous ‘man-eating’ crocodiles inhabit India and Africa.” P. 91. Compare Schomburgk, inRaleigh’s Discovery of Guiana, p. 57.↑19If the slaughter of the alligator in the Gulf States continues for a few years longer, at the rate which has prevailed during the past few decades, the reptile will be exterminated. According to theBulletin of the U. S. Fish Commission, XI, 1891, p. 343, it is estimated that 2,500,000 were killed in Florida between 1880 and 1894.↑20Dec. II, Book 9.↑21Dec. I, Book 9.↑22TheCeroxylon andicolaand theKunthia montanagrow at altitudes of from 6,000 to 9,000 feet, and, according to Humboldt, palms are found in the Paramo de Guanucos, 13,000 feet above sea level.↑23Historia Naturalis Palmarum, Tom. I, p. 156, Lipsiæ. 1850.↑24The countries here mentioned, especially Palestine, are now comparatively bare of palms.↑25According to a legend, this was the first date-palm seen in Spain, and was planted by the calif himself, in front of his palace, as a souvenir of his early home.↑26Quesada and his companions made their celebrated voyage from Guatiqui to the mouth of the river, a distance of nearly seven hundred miles, in twelve days. Considering that they had only rudely-constructed brigantines and dugouts, their trip, compared with ours made in a steamboat under the most favorable conditions in but little less than half the time, was truly remarkable.↑27Paradiso, Canto XIII, 130 et 136–138.↑

CHAPTER XIITHE VALLEY OF THE MAGDALENA“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...Al contemplar tu frente coronadaDe los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,Lleno solo de ti, siento mi almaArrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,Que entre profundos remolinos braman,De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1—Manuel M. Madiedo.While in Guaduas we met a Scotch engineer, who was superintendent of a gold mine in the mountains west of Honda. Desiring to know the truth about the excessive temperature of this place, about which we had heard so many reports, we asked him if it was really true that the heat in Honda was as intense as represented.“You will,” he said, “find it the hottest place you have ever visited. It is certainly the most torrid place I know, and I have been something of a globe-trotter in my time. Hades, if I have caught the meaning of the word, as used in the Revised Version, is quite temperate in comparison with it. Business frequently calls me to Bogotá, and, on my way thither, I must necessarily pass through Honda, but I never stop there longer than is absolutely necessary, and I always try to avoid being there in the daytime. If I must stop there for a few hours, I time my journey so as to arrive there at night, and make it a point to leave before morning. Hot? I think it is the hottest and most suffocatingspot on earth. It has always been a mystery to me how people can live there at all. I know of nothing to compare it with except one of the burning pits of Dante’s Inferno.”Had we not learned by long experience how to discount such statements, the prospect of spending some days in a town with such a reputation for grilling the stranger within its gates, would have been anything but inviting. But we had heard similar reports about the llanos and the valley of the Orinoco, and had found, on arriving in these regions, that the temperature said to prevail there had been greatly exaggerated. The same we found to be true of Honda. During our sojourn there, our thermometer never registered more than 86° F. in the shade. Of course, around midday it was uncomfortable in the sun, but I have been in many places in the United States where I suffered more from the heat than I did in Honda.The town is about seven hundred feet above sea level and counts nearly four thousand inhabitants. It is separated into two parts by the river Guali, which here enters the Magdalena. Being the centre of traffic for Bogotá, the upper Magdalena, and the mining district round about Mariquita, it is a place of considerable importance. As soon, however, as the Colombian National Railway, now nearing completion, shall have connected Girardot with Bogotá, Honda will lose the commercial supremacy it has maintained for nearly three centuries. There will then be little reason for a town in this place, and it will lapse into a straggling village similar to many others along the river.And the Muisca Trail, over which we had so delightful a ride, will be no longer needed, and will soon disappear in the dense and rank vegetation through which it passes. Then, too, will disappear those long and picturesque mule-trains, that so often crowded us to the roadside on our way from Bogotá, and which have been almost the sole means employed for the transportation of freight and passengers since the capital was founded by Quesada nearly four centuriesago. We shall always congratulate ourselves that we were able to make the trip on mule-back rather than by a railway train. We can thus feel that we have, to a great extent, seen the country as it was in colonial times—before its character was modified by the innovations of modern progress and the introduction of modern inventions.In 1805 Honda was visited by a terrific earthquake, from the effects of which it has never recovered. Everywhere are evidences of the frightful cataclysm. Some of the largest and most important structures are still in ruins. Nor has any attempt ever been made to restore certain quarters of the town to their prior condition.After a few days’ halt at Honda, we were ready to continue our journey towards the Caribbean. The rapids of the Magdalena make it impracticable for steamers to ascend the river as far as the town. For this reason, it is necessary to go by rail to La Dorada, eighteen miles northwards. But, although the distance is so short, it takes two hours for the train to make the run. The road, however, passes through a picturesque country and time passes pleasantly and quickly. Before one realizes it, one is at La Dorada, where the transfer is made to the steamer bound for Barranquilla.There are several lines of steamboats plying between La Dorada and Barranquilla and intermediate points. But all the boats, which are stern-wheelers, are quite small. The largest of them will not carry more than four hundred tons. Usually the tonnage is much less—not more than one or two hundred tons.2Our boat, which was recommended as the best and the most comfortable on the river, was one of the largest and newest, but, if it was the best, it is difficult to conceive what the others must have been.A glance was sufficient to convince us that the craft on the Magdalena are in every way inferior to those on the Orinoco and its affluents. The Venezuelan boats are larger, and with incomparably better equipment and appointments. They are clean, well kept, and the service is good. Their cabins are commodious and well ventilated. They are, besides, provided with all necessary furniture and the berths are as comfortable as could be desired.But how different is it on the Magdalena boats! In the cabins, in place of berths with neat bedding, there is a bare cot, usually of questionable cleanliness. Each passenger is supposed to supply his own bedding. As to lavatories and bathrooms, those that we saw were filthy beyond description. Our stewards were half-dressed, barefooted, slovenly, unwashed negro boys, who seemed to have been picked up on the streets at random, just before the boat left its moorings. The cuisine and service were in keeping with everything else, and left very much room for improvement. The natives, having nothing better, seemed to be satisfied with the conditions that obtained. The foreigners, however, and there were representatives of several nationalities aboard, could never become reconciled to the lack of so many things essential to comfortable traveling, and were always glad when their river experiences were at an end.For ourselves, who had been roughing it so long, the trip down the river was not so trying as it was for many others. We were, besides, better prepared for such a journey than the other passengers. We had our camping outfits with us, together with clean bedding, which had received the attention of the laundress before we left Bogotá. We had, besides, good cumare hammocks, and mosquito nets, so that we had nothing to apprehend from filth, vermin or insects. Thus equipped, we really enjoyed our voyage on the Magdalena, but we were probably the only ones who did.After we had gotten fairly started down stream, andcould contemplate at our leisure the rich tropical vegetation that fringed both banks, our minds reverted to the first trip made down this river by Europeans. The travelers were the celebrated conquistadores, of whom mention has already been made, viz., Quesada, Belalcazar and Federmann. They embarked with a number of soldiers at Guataqui, a short distance above Honda. But they had scarcely started on their downward course, before they encountered the rapids at the mouth of the Guali. They were then obliged to unload their two brigantines and canoes and transport their contents to the lower part of the cataract, whence, after reloading, they were able to proceed again on their long journey to Cartagena.It was while passing this point that Quesada learned from his Indian boatmen of the existence of gold in the valley of the Guali. In consequence of this information, the town of Marquita was founded without delay, and has ever since been a mining centre of considerable importance. It was in this place that Quesada died after his return from Spain. From here his remains were transferred to the Cathedral of Bogotá, where they still repose.According to Padre Simon, Quesada and his companions were frequently, during their journey down the river, attacked by Indians, “who came out to salute them and speed their way with a shower of poisoned arrows.” “With the help of God,” he continues, “joined to eternal vigilance, their own valor and a liberal supply of powder and firearms with which the soldiers of Belalcazar were provided, they were able finally to arrive at Cartagena, and give the first information regarding the great campaign in which Quesada and his followers had achieved such signal success.”3The Magdalena, like many other water courses in South America, was at first known as the Rio Grande—the great river. It was subsequently given the name it now bearsin honor of St. Mary Magdalene.4At times it is comparatively narrow and deep. Then navigation is easy and without danger. At other times,“Shallow, disreputable, vastIt spreads across the western plains.”Then progress is difficult, and the boat may run into a sand bar at any moment. And if the river should then be falling, it may be impossible to get the craft free until the water rises. Only a short time before our trip one of the steamers had been held in a sand bank for forty days. As it was not near any place where provisions could be obtained, the passengers suffered greatly from hunger, not to speak of the suspense and enforced detention on an uncomfortable boat.Owing to the shallowness of the river, the boat was, during the first part of the voyage, always tied up for the night at the first tree or stump that might be found on the bank at sunset. The following morning we were supposed to resume our journey at daybreak, but, as the firemen did not begin to get up steam before that time, it was usually an hour after sunrise before we were under way. We stopped at every village and warehouse along the river, sometimes to deliver the mail, often consisting of only a single letter or package, or to take on a passenger. Two or three times a day, also, we halted to take on wood to supply the furnace with fuel, for here, as on the Meta, coal is not used. Fortunately, we were never obliged, as on the Meta, to delay until the wood could be cut. Large wood piles are found every few miles all along the river. They usually belong to a negro, who has a hut or shed near by, together with a small garden and a few domestic animals which supply him and his family with food in their sequestered home.We stopped at several large warehouses, many of themconstructed of corrugated iron from the United States. This seems strange in a land where timber is so abundant. But there are no sawmills in the Magdalena valley. South of Barranquilla—where but little lumber is produced—imported lumber would be more expensive and less durable than iron. At these places the chief articles of merchandise are coffee, cacao, hides and vegetable ivory. This last product, also called ivory nuts, is the fruit of a species of palm known asPhytelephas macrocarpa,5and constitutes, in this part of Colombia, an important article of commerce. For many things it is a good substitute for elephant ivory, which it rivals in whiteness, beauty and solidity, and collecting it for shipment gives occupation to quite a number of the poor inhabitants of the Magdalena valley.We usually went ashore at the different landing places to see the people and familiarize ourselves with their mode of life. It was generally as simple and primitive as possible—almost as primitive, in some instances, as we conceive it to have been in the Quaternary period or in the days of the Troglodytes. Often their dwellings were little more than palm-thatched sheds—barely sufficient to shield their occupants from sun and rain. Atulpa, consisting of three stones, served them in lieu of a stove, and on this they broiled the fish caught in the river, or prepared theirarepas—corn cakes—or theirsancocho, a kind of ragout, as popular in some parts of Colombia as it is in Venezuela.We were surprised to see in the houses and shops along the Magdalena valley—what we had often observed in various parts of Colombia and Venezuela—the large number of illustrated circulars of Spanish, English and French proprietary medicines. The insides of certain houses were sometimes quite plastered over with them. But what was more surprising was the number of lithographs we saw ofthe German Emperor. Sometimes he was represented alone, at others he was depicted as surrounded by the members of his family. In several places we saw pictures not only of the emperor and his family, but also those of his father and grandfather and Bismarck. And the remarkable thing about it was that, in some cases, there were no Germans living within hundreds of miles of where we came across these pictures. Had some enthusiastic Teuton tried to start a propaganda in favor of the Vaterland by distributing broadcast these engravings of the imperial family? I know not, but, judging solely from the number of their pictures we came across in Venezuela and Colombia, one would be led to suppose that the Hohenzollern rulers are the most popular of potentates, at least in this part of South America.While stopping to take on some rubber at a certain small village, we had a remarkable illustration of the rapidity with which the bed of the river is sometimes changed, even when the water is comparatively low. We had scarcely reached the landing place when there was a terrific crash, occasioned by the falling in of a large section of the bank on which the village was built. Soon afterwards another section gave way, and then a third and a fourth. The whole bank seemed to be undermined by the river, and, although the warehouse was fully fifty feet away from the water when we arrived, so much of the bank had been carried away in less than half an hour, that not only the contents of the building, but also the building itself had to be hurriedly removed in order that it and the merchandise stored within might not be borne away by the resistless current. As the structure was of light bamboo, and put together with a view to such an emergency, the transfer was not a difficult task. When we started to continue our course, it looked as if the eroding action of the river would necessitate the changing of the site of the entire village before nightfall.Such changes in the course of the river are not uncommon.They are going on all the time in some part or other of the valley. One may frequently see immense masses of earth suddenly detached, which are a serious menace to the champans6—large covered flat-boats—and other small craft that happen to pass by at the time. Sometimes the giants of the forest are thus wrested from their footholds, and may be seen drifting down stream together with masses of vegetation attached to them. At times, too, masses of earth, like floating islets, are visible, and may travel a long distance down stream before their course is arrested by an island or a sand bar.Ordinarily the changes in the river bed are gradual and occasion little danger to life or property. Sometimes, however, during the rainy season, and when the flood is unusually high, widespread devastation is the result. Whole villages are swept away by the deluge; and towns, that were before important commercial centres, are suddenly isolated and left far from the navigable part of the river. Places that before were favorably situated are, after the flood, found to be in the midst of pestiferous morasses. Such has been the fate of many places along the waterways of Colombia, but more notably in the great island of Mompos, near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena. Here several places that were at onetime centres of industrial and agricultural activity, have long since either ceased to exist or lost entirely their pristine importance.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.The town of Mompos is probably the most remarkable example of this kind. Founded in 1539 by Alonso de Heredia, it is one of the oldest towns in the republic, and was for generations the most important commercial centre between Cartagena and Honda. But owing to a displacement of the main channel of the river, and the filling in of the branch of the river on which the town was built, it is now practically deprived of its former means of communication with the rest of the country, and is rapidly verging towards extinction.The Magdalena, as a commercial highway, has been much neglected. As a consequence, no one can calculate when leaving Honda, how long it will take him to reach Barranquilla. It may require five or six days, or it may demand twice that much time. All depends on the shifting bed of the river, or the blocking of the channel by sand bars and accumulations of floating timber. By reason of these obstructions and the ever-varying depth of the main channel, navigation is usually impossible at night, except below the island of Mompos, where the volume of water is swelled by the tribute of the mighty Cauca.If the Magdalena were under the supervision of a corps of competent engineers, having at their disposal the necessary dredges and other appliances for keeping the main channel in prime condition, a properly constructed boat would easily make the trip from Honda to the mouth of the river in two days, and traverse the same course up stream in three days at most. It is really a pity to see such a splendid water course so neglected. If cared for as it should be, it could easily be rendered an artery for inland commerce of the first importance. As it is, transportation, as now carried on, is always slow and uncertain, and never free from danger and disaster.As a serviceable means of communication with the outside world we were constantly contrasting the Magdalena with the Meta. From our observations, we should consider the Meta, from its junction with the Orinoco to Cabuyaro or even to the mouth of the Humea, as a safer waterway than the Magdalena. Only twice did our boat graze a sand bank in the Meta, but it continued its course without a moment’s stoppage. In the Magdalena, however, we frequently ran into sand bars, or shallow water, and, on several occasions, had difficulty in extricating and floating our craft. Once we were delayed for some time, and began to fear that, owing to the falling water, we should be stranded for weeks, as other boats had been not long before.When peace shall have been firmly established in Colombia, and its finances shall have been placed on a satisfactory basis, the patriotic and far-seeing statesmen of the republic, will, I am convinced, see the necessity of carrying out the plan of the former Archbishop and Viceroy of New Granada—Don Antonio Caballero y Gongora—and connecting Bogotá with Europe by means of the Meta and the Orinoco. It will not be a difficult feat of engineering to build a railroad from the capital to a suitable point on the Meta, and the length of such a road need not exceed one hundred and fifty miles at most. This will bring Bogatá within eight or ten hours of the head waters of navigation, and develop the most valuable and most productive grazing section of the country.The highest point the road need reach in crossing the Eastern Cordilleras will be less than that of several passes in Colorado, where the Rocky Mountains are scaled by the iron-horse with a long train of cargo behind him. The pass of Chipaque, by which we entered thealtiplaniciesof Bogotá, is several thousand feet lower than the heights crossed by the railways leading from the waters of the Pacific to Lake Titicaca, and to Argentina by way of Cumbre Pass, and is nearly a mile lower than the pointwhere the Galera tunnel pierces the Cordillera on the way from Lima to Oroya.7What Colombia really needs is the betterment of both its great waterways—the Meta for the eastern and the Magdalena for the western part of the republic. Until they shall both have been put in such condition as to be navigable during the entire year, it will be impossible fully to develop the marvelous resources of this extensive country. River traffic will always remain cheaper than traffic by rail, and, on account of many physical difficulties, it is highly improbable that certain valuable sections of territory will ever be tapped by railroads. When, however, these two main arteries of commerce shall have received the attention they deserve and shall have been put in communication with the rich grazing, mining and agricultural regions by the various lines of railway that are contemplated or in course of construction, Colombia will at once take a position among the richest and most flourishing republics of South America. Only those who have traveled through it can fully realize its wonderful natural riches, or form an adequate conception of its vast extent. Sufficient to state that its area is more than ten times as great as the state of New York, or as great as that of France, Germany and the British Isles combined.As to the great Pan-American line which has been projected to connect New York with Buenos Ayres, that is talked of in Colombia as well as in the United States. But when one contemplates the enormous engineering difficulties to be encountered in the construction of the section extending from Costa Rica to the frontier of Ecuador, one is compelled to regard the project as a much more arduous undertaking than some of its enthusiastic promoters would have us believe. Railway communication will soon be completefrom Buenos Ayres to Central Peru, and, judging by work now being accomplished in Ecuador, steel rails will soon span the country from the northern to the southern boundaries of this republic. But with all this work completed, the most difficult part of the colossal enterprise will still remain untouched. Even should the road eventually be completed, as is possible, it is still doubtful whether long stretches of it would ever pay even a nominal interest on the investment.The part of the Magdalena valley between Honda and the island of Mompos is but sparsely inhabited. Most of the inhabitants are Indians, mestizos, or negroes, the descendants of former slaves.8On account of the heat and malaria that always prevail in the lowlands, but few white men are found here, and their sojourn, as a rule, is only temporary. But near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena, and thence to the Caribbean, there are rich and extensiveesteros—grazing lands—covered with succulent Para and Guinea grasses, several feet high. In these broad plains, there are no fewer than half a million cattle, not to speak of large numbers of horses, mules and other domestic animals. Some of the cattle we saw reminded us of the fat, sleek animals we had seen on the llanos watered by the Rio Negro and the Humea. Under more favorable conditions the number could greatly be increased.The scenery along the Magdalena is much like that along the Meta and the Orinoco, except that along the western river one sees more of the mountains, especially in the southern part. The vegetation is similar in character and quite as varied and exuberant. On both sides of the river trees and bushes are so massed together as toform an impenetrable wall. Everywhere there is a veritable maze of creeping plants, of bromelias, bignonias, passifloras. And everywhere, too, are lianas—aptly named monkey-ladders—which bind tree to tree and branch to branch. Usually they are single, like ropes—whence their name bush ropes—but often they are twined together like strands in a cable. Frequently they are seen descending from the topmost part of a tree to the ground, where they forthwith strike root and present the appearance of the stays and shrouds of a ship’s main mast. And where there is air and sunshine, these lianas, which often form bights like ropes, are loaded with epiphytes of all kinds, and decorated with the rarest and most beautiful orchids. Indeed, the regions on both sides of the Magdalena have long been favorite resorts for the orchid hunters in the employ of the florists and merchant princes of the United States and Europe. From here these bizarre vegetable forms are shipped by thousands. One enthusiastic English collector tells us how he secured, as the result of two months’ work about ten thousand plants of the highly prizedOdontoglossum. But to obtain these orchids he was obliged to fell some four thousand trees.“The most magnificent sight,” he writes, “for even the most stoical observer, is the immense clumps ofCattleya Mendelii, each new bulb bearing four or five of its gorgeous rose-colored flowers, many of them growing in the full sun, or with very little shade, and possessing a glowing color which is very difficult to get in the stuffy hothouses where the plants are cultivated. Some of these plants, considering their size and the slowness of growth, must have taken many years to develop, for I have taken plants from the trees with five hundred bulbs, and as many as one hundred spikes of flowers, which, to a lover of orchids, is a sight worth traveling from Europe to see.”9It is when contemplating the marvelous variety andluxuriance of intertropical flora—of which one in our northern climes can have no adequate conception—that one is tempted to exclaim with Wordsworth:—“It is my faith, that every flowerEnjoys the air it breathes.”10And if the extraordinary claims which Professors Wagner, France and G. H. Darwin make for plants be true, viz., that they have minds and are conscious of their existence, that they feel pain and have memories, then, indeed, should we be disposed to regard the exuberant and wondrously developed plants of the equatorial world as occupying the highest plane in the evolutionary process of vegetable life.Passing the embouchure of the Opon, on the right bank of the Magdalena, evoked, in a special manner, memories of Quesada and his valiant band. It was here they left the Magdalena during that memorable expedition that made them the undisputed masters of the country now known as Colombia. More than eight months had passed since they had started from Santa Marta on their career of discovery and conquest. The difficulties they had to encounter and the sufferings they had to endure were extreme. Mosquitoes, wasps, ants and other insects; reptiles and jaguars gave them no rest, day or night. Certain kinds of worms, the old chroniclers tell us, buried themselves in the flesh of the exhausted and half-famished men and caused them untold agony. Indians everywhere laid ambush for them, and assailed them with poisoned arrows from every point of vantage. Even the elements seemed to conspire against them. There was a continual downpour of rain, so that it was impossible to light a fire for any purpose. Their arms were almost destroyed by rust, and they were left withouta single dry charge of powder. Their provisions became exhausted and starvation stared them in the face. To preserve life they devoured their sword scabbards and every article of leather they had with them. There was incessant thunder, unchanging gloom, eternal horror, and other features of the pit infernal. Their course was through dense underbrush and pestiferous swamps and up precipitous acclivities, whither they had to drag their weakened horses by long lianas that served the purpose of ropes.11Finally, after the most heroic efforts, they came to a place where they found provisions—a veritable land of promise for the suffering but intrepid Spaniards. They had left behind them the inhospitable sierras of the Opon, and were on the verge of the fertile plateau of Cundinamarca, that constituted the home of the Muiscas. Here they found maize, potatoes,12yucas, beans, tomatoes and, as Padre Simon phrases it, “a thousand otherchucherias—titbits—of the aborigines.” Well could they, in the language of Castellanos, exclaim, with thanksgiving:“A good land! A good land! A land which puts an end to our suffering, a land of gold, a land of plenty. A land for a home, a land of benediction, bright and serene.”It was then that the enthusiastic soldiers, whose courage would often have faltered, had it not been for the determination and perseverance of their invincible leader, gathered around Quesada to congratulate him on the successful issueof his great undertaking, and to assure him of their undying loyalty in any future enterprise in which he might require their services.And well they might render the noble licentiate the meed of praise he so well deserved, for had it not been for him, the expedition would have been a failure, and they would undoubtedly have perished before they could have returned to Santa Marta, as had so many of their companions, who had turned back before the ascent of the Cordillera was begun. To some of his officers who, in view of the unheard-of difficulties they had to encounter, recommended that the expedition be abandoned, he replied that he would regard as a personal enemy any one who, in future, would make such a pusillanimous proposal and one so foreign to Spanish valor.All in all, he was one of the bravest and most humane of the conquistadores, and successfully performed a task before which a less valorous commander would have given up in despair. His achievements obscure by their brilliancy and daring those of Amadis and Roldan and are in no wise inferior to those of any of the conquistadores. They may truthfully, in the words of Bacon, written anent a performance of Sir Richard Grenville, be styled as “memorable beyond credit, and to the height of some heroical fable.”Quesada has taken his place in Valhalla among the greatest of the world’s heroes, and his memory will endure as long as splendid deeds of prowess shall stir the souls of men. Of him and his gallant companions one can say what Peter Martyr wrote of their countrymen in general:—“Wherefore, the Spanyardes in these owre dayes and theyr noble enterpryses, doo not gyue place eyther to the factes of Saturnus, or Hercules, or any other of the ancient princes of famous memorie, which werecanonizedamonge the goddes cauled Heroes for theyr searchinge of newe landes, and regions, and bringinge the same to better culture and ciuilitie.”13Lower down the Magdalena, on the left bank of the river, we approached the scene of the exploits of another of the distinguished conquistadores—Pedro de Heredia, the founder of Cartagena. After he had reduced to submission the Indians who had been victorious over Ojeda, he started towards the Magdalena, where he collected such immense treasures of gold that when it was divided, each soldier received no less than 6,000 ducats. This was the equivalent of $48,000 in gold at the present valuation of this metal, and was the largest apportionment of spoil, at least, so far as private soldiers were concerned, made during the conquest.14He afterwards made a similar expedition to the territories drained by the San Jorge and the Nechi, affluents of the Cauca, in search of the rich veins whence the Indians extracted their gold. He did not find the objects of his quest, but came across several rich cemeteries, in which the dead had been interred with their jewels, and a sanctuary with idols adorned with plates of gold. From these he secured treasures to the amount of more than $3,000,000 of our money.15Strange as it may seem, the method Heredia resorted to of securing gold, the rifling of thehuacas—burial places—of the aborigines, has been continued until the present day. There are still men in Colombia, notably in Antioquia—huaqueros, they are called—who gain a livelihood by searching for huacas and extracting from them the gold and emeralds they frequently contain.The year before our trip there appeared in an English magazine, the following paragraph in an article purporting to give a picture of the Magdalena valley and its life:—“Anchored in the forest at midnight, the traveler hearsthe deep growl of the jaguar, the sharp squeal of the wild cat, the howl of the howler monkey, the long moan of the sloth, and the last scream of the wild pig, pierced by the claws of some patient but ferocious animal ambushed during the past hour, with many other sounds of life, terror and conflict that fall strangely on the European ear, and, if he waits and watches until the dawn, he may see the alligator dragging his ugly bulk out of the water, crowds of turtles trailing on the sands, the deer and the tapir coming down to drink, thousands of white cranes on the branches nearest to their prey, thousands of gray ones already wading leg-deep, and many more thousands of other birds clouding the dim horizon, all waiting for the light ere they begin their work of life and slaughter.... With the alligators in shoals at the bottom of the river, and the millions of birds above its surface, one wonders how any fish are left, yet the river is always literally teeming with fish, as though conscious of the demands it has to meet.”Although we were always on the alert, so as to miss nothing of interest, especially anything that concerned the animal life of the tropics, we must confess that in all our experience we never heard growls, squeals, howls, moans, screams, or other sounds of terror and conflict, either along the Magdalena or anywhere else in South America. And we spent nearly a year in the country, and often traveled weeks at a time in the wild virgin forest, far away from human habitations of every kind. Nor did we ever perceive any of the animals that certain tourists would lead one to believe can be seen in such numbers everywhere, even from the deck of a passing steamer. Nowhere along the Orinoco, the Meta, the Magdalena, or elsewhere, did we ever catch even a glimpse of a jaguar or a puma, a manati or a sloth, a wild cat or a wild pig. More than this, not once, during our entire trip through Venezuela and Colombia, through forests and plains, did we ever see a single monkey, except two or three that were kept as petsby the natives. This may seem an incredible statement. I would have believed such an experience as ours to be absolutely impossible, especially in view of what writers and travelers in South America have told us regarding the immense number of wild animals of all kinds everywhere visible in equatorial wilds. But I am stating a fact that I am quite unable to reconcile with the contrary experiences of others who, according to their own admission, have seen but little, compared with what we saw, of the lands through which we passed. I have seen more large game on the plains of New Mexico and Wyoming, from the window of a Pullman car, in a single trip to and from the Pacific coast, than I ever saw in the wilds of South America during nearly a twelvemonth.Nor did we ever see along the Magdalena, or anywhere else, the “thousands of white cranes on branches,” nor the “thousands of gray ones wading leg-deep,” nor the “many more thousands clouding the dim horizon,” of which the writer of the above-mentioned article professes to have been the fortunate spectator. We rarely saw more than a few dozen cranes at a time—never a hundred, and I have reason to believe we enjoyed very favorable opportunities, at least during a portion of our long journey, for seeing what was to be seen. At no time did we ever observe as many birds in the air at one time as I have frequently seen in the United States. I feel safe in asserting positively that the number of wild pigeons I have frequently noted in a single flock in the United States, would more than equal that of all the birds combined that we saw while in the tropics.Mr. F. Lorraine Petre evidently had an experience somewhat similar to ours. In his recent work on Colombia, he tells us frankly that one sees little of animal life on the Magdalena, that “of the mammalia one sees and hears little.... Of the jaguars, the pumas, the sloths, the peccaries, the deer, the tapirs, and other animals, dangerous or harmless, we saw or heard as little as we did of the bears which inhabit the hills beyond. It is surprisingthat, tied up, as we often were, right against the forest, we should not have heard the night call of the carnivora, or the sharp bark of the frightened deer, but truth compels us to admit that we did not, and, moreover, that the cry of even the howling monkey did not salute us.”16The number of birds observed along the Magdalena was not greater than I have frequently seen in the valleys of the Missouri or the Columbia. Most of these were parrots and macaws. Always noisy and restless, always flying and climbing about, except when eating fruit or cracking nuts, one is at times tempted to describe them as feathered relatives of the monkey. The parrots are sometimes seen in flocks, and their piercing cries are at times almost deafening. They are a sociable bird and are usually seen in considerable numbers. The macaws are remarkable for always flying in pairs, and for their brilliant colors. Their body is flaming scarlet, their wings are tinged with various shades of red, yellow, green and blue, while their tail is bright blue and scarlet. They, too, like parrots, are very vociferous, and, although they may occasionally be found in large numbers, they always fly two and two.The large animals most frequently seen along the Magdalena, as along other tropical rivers, are those horrid monsters, “ambiguous between sea and land,” the cayman and “the scaly crocodile.” But even they are not so numerous as certain travelers would have us believe. The largest number we ever saw at one time was fifteen. They were sunning themselves on aplaya—sand bank—below the island of Mompos. On the Orinoco and the Meta we never beheld more than eight at any one time—unless wewere to count a number of little ones, just hatched, which Luisito, our colored boy, caught one day while we were taking on wood on the lower Meta.17The early Spaniards called all these saurians by the general name oflagartos—lizards. The English afterwards spoke of a single animal as a lagarto, whence the present name alligator. Modern writers speak of them indiscriminately as alligators or crocodiles. As a matter of fact, several species of both alligators and crocodiles are found in the equatorial regions. But, notwithstanding all that has hitherto been written about them, their distinction and definition, their classification still remains a matter of difficulty. Some specimens have been found whose classification is so perplexing that naturalists are still undecided whether to regard them as crocodiles or alligators. In this respect they are much like Shakespeare’s two lovers, “Two distincts, division none.”The name cayman is employed in Venezuela and Colombia to designate any of these saurians. Following the classification adopted in the British Museum the cayman is distinct from both alligator and crocodile. More than this. According to the British system of classification, there are no alligators at all in South America, while, in the waters of Colombia and Venezuela, there are two species of crocodile and three species of cayman.Probably more fabulous accounts have obtained about crocodiles than about any other animal. In spite of the old saying to the contrary, they never shed tears. And notwithstanding the fact that the ancient Egyptians gave the crocodile divine honors, because, being tongueless, it wasmade in hieroglyphical writing, a symbol of the Divinity, it is now known that the tongue of this erstwhile god is quite large, except at the tip. Similarly, all the stories that have so long been current about the impenetrability of the animal’s hide, are quite without foundation. How often have we not been told that it is impossible to kill a crocodile, with even the best Winchester, unless the ball enter the eye or strike under the soft, fleshy parts of the front legs? Their plated skin is easily pierced by an ordinary rifle or revolver, and a mortal wound ensues whenever a vital part is penetrated.Not less erroneous are the ideas that so widely prevail regarding the ferocity of the crocodile and the cayman. On the contrary, they are, in their native state, very timid animals, and rarely exhibit hostility towards man, except when cornered. Then, like most other animals, they will fight with great fierceness. They make for the water as soon as they see one approach them, and it is often far from easy to get near them. We often saw the natives enter rivers frequented by crocodiles and caymans, something they surely would not have done if the danger were as great as ordinarily imagined. In Venezuela the Indian or mestizo has a much greater dread of the ray or carib fish than of the cayman.18Some attempts have been made, both on the Orinoco and the Magdalena, to secure the hides of crocodiles and caymans for commercial purposes, but the expense of preparing them for the market proved to be so great that the work had to be abandoned.19The early explorers of the New World had many stories to tell about the cayman and the crocodile, and many of them have apparently survived among the natives until the present day. But there were many other animals that made even a greater impression on them. It will suffice to reproduce Peter Martyr’s quaint account of two of these representatives of the American fauna. The first is the tapir, of which he writes as follows:—“But there is especially one beast engendered here, in which nature hath endeuoured to shew her cunnyng. This beaste is as bygge as an oxe, armed with a longe snoute lyke an elephant, and yet no elephant. Of the colour of an oxe and yet noo oxe. With the houfe of a horse, and yet noo horse. With eares also much lyke vnto an elephant, but not soo open nor soo much hangying downe: yet much wyder then the eares of any other beaste.”20The other animal that excited the wonder of Martyr and his contemporaries was the sloth, of which he says:— “Emonge these trees is fownde that monstrous beaste with a snowte lyke a foxe, a tayle lyke a marmasette, eares lyke a batte, handes lyke a man, and feete lyke an ape, bearing her whelpes abowte with her in an owtwarde bellye much lyke vnto a greate bagge or purse. The dead carkas of this beaste, you sawe with me, and turned it ouer and ouer with yowre owne handes, marueylynge at that newe belly and wonderful prouision of nature. They say it is knownen by experience, that shee neuer letteth her whelpes goo owte of that purse, except it be eyther to play, or to sucke, vntyl suche tyme that they bee able to gette theyr lyuing by them selues.”21The part of the valley below the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena was quite different from that above. The country contained more inhabitants, and the denseforests that had hitherto bordered the river gave place to broad savannas, on which grazed thousands of cattle, so buried in the Para and Guinea grasses, that frequently we could discern only their horns. Along the river banks were the estates of well-to-dohaciendados—some of them foreigners—and the villages, that before were extremely rare, became more numerous. The aspect of the country was less wild than that through which we had just passed, and betokened a certain measure of prosperity, at least so far as the grazing interests were concerned.We could now travel day and night, for the river was so deep that sand bars were no longer to be apprehended. And then we had the most delightful moonlight nights. The air was balmy and laden with an exquisite fragrance,“Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,”a constant invitation to repose anddolce far niente. The surpassing loveliness of the scene, the magic stillness of the vast solitude through which we were so peacefully gliding, the broad expanse of one of the world’s great rivers, the weird silhouettes cast by the passing palms on the moonlit waters—all these things contributed towards rendering our last night on the river a fitting finale to the others—all of which were in the highest degree enjoyable. Seated on the forward deck of our steamer, we could exclaim in the words of the choric song of Tennyson’sLotos-Eaters:—“How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,With half-shut eyes ever to seemFalling asleep in a half-dream!Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.”The following morning—our last day on the Magdalena—found us at Calamar. Here some of our fellow-passengers disembarked to take the train to Cartagena, sixty-five miles to the westward. From Calamar to Barranquilla,the chief northern terminus of river navigation, is sixty-six miles. This distance we expected to make in a few hours, but for reasons presently to be given, we were unexpectedly delayed within sight of Barranquilla, the goal that marked the completion of another important stage in our journey.Our last day on the Magdalena was a bright balmy one in June. We spent the entire time on the forward part of the upper deck, fanned by the delightful breezes that were wafted from the Caribbean. The river here has about the same width as has the Mississippi at New Orleans, but the scenery is far more attractive. It flows through a broad, level, grass-covered savanna, which extends beyond the limits of vision, and which is dotted here and there with small villages and flourishing haciendas. Some of the houses near the river banks have a most cozy appearance. They are almost embowered in a mass of flowers of every hue, and surrounded by lofty palms whose lovely emerald coronals were each a picture of rarest beauty.“These princes of the vegetable world” always had a peculiar fascination for us, no matter where we saw them. And during our long journey from the delta of the Orinoco they were never absent from view even for a single hour. When one species disappeared it was replaced by another, and thus they followed us from the Atlantic wave to the lofty crest of Suma Paz. The ocean-loving cocoa gave place to the moriche, and this was in turn succeeded by the corneto of the llanos and the wax palm of the Sierras.22It is quite impossible for the inhabitants of our northern climes to have anything approaching an adequate conception of the grace and beauty and surpassing loveliness of the omnipresent palms of the equatorial world. Awayfrom heat and sunshine, they are quite devoid of the luxuriance and stateliness that characterize them in the tropics. In Europe, for instance, there is but a single palm that is indigenous—theChamærops humilis. The date palm was introduced from the East. In the tropics, however, about eleven hundred species of palms are known, and there is reason to believe that, when this part of the world shall have been thoroughly explored, many new species shall be discovered.The habits as well as the habitats of palms were a source of unfailing interest to us. Some are solitary and are rarely found forming groups with other trees of their species. Others, like the date palm, are quite gregarious and often form extensive clumps. Others still are said to be “social,” because they occupy extensive tracts almost to the entire exclusion of other kinds of trees. Various species ofMauritia,Attalea,CocoaandCoperniciaare social palms, and thepalmares—palm groves—formed by them constitute the most attractive features of tropical landscapes.We once saw near the river’s bank a grove of this kind composed of palms of unusual height and beauty. It had been selected as the last resting place of the denizens of a neighboring village, and was, to our mind, the most beautiful cemetery in the world. Could we have our choice, we should prefer, by far, to repose under one of those noble frond-bearing shafts to being shelved away in the costliest marble vault of Père Lachaise.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.Certain palms affect the open savanna, others seek the solitudes of the forest, while still others are most frequently found midway between these two—that is, on the belt of land that separates forest from plain. Some palms, like the cocoa, seem to require an atmosphere that is slightly saline, and thrive best near the ocean’s shore. Others apparently attain their greatest development in marshes and lowlands, while others again demand the arid plain or the lofty mountain plateau.In spite of their noble appearance and their aspect of perennial youth, palms, as a rule, are short-lived. None of them ever attain the age of the venerable patriarchs of our northern forests. According to Martius, the span of a palm’s life never exceeds that of a few generations of men. The areca catechu runs its course in forty or fifty years, the cocoa attains an age of one hundred or one hundred and twenty years at most, while the date palm, which probably lives the longest, usually rounds out its existence within the period of two centuries.Some palms, like theMetroxylon, for instance, never survive fructification. It fruits but once, and then, as Martius so graphically expresses it, “nobilis arbor mox riget, perit et cadit”—the noble tree presently withers, perishes and falls. But, continues the same writer, “there is pleasure and solace in the thought that palms never die without yielding fruit, thereby insuring the continuance of the species.” And then, as is his wont when opportunity offers, he takes occasion from this circumstance to moralize as follows: “To labor, to flourish, to fructify is granted not only to the palm but to man also.”23In the foregoing pages I have mentioned some of the countless uses made of palms, especially by the inhabitants of the tropics. It would, however, require a large volume to enumerate all the purposes for which they are employed. It can, however, safely be asserted that no family in the great vegetable kingdom more completely meets the necessities of millions of people than does that of the noble and ever-beautiful Palmaceæ.Like Martius, we always found in the contemplation of the palm a source of special joy and peace. To him the palm was what literature was to Cicero, a consolation in trial and affliction, and the delight and inspiration of maturer years. In the palm we always found something to elevate the mind, something that fascinated us and stirred our emotions in a manner that often surprised us. For us,as for myriads of others who have lived and struggled and attained the goal of the heart’s desire, the palm was the emblem of victory, of a higher and better life beyond the tomb, of a happy, glorious immortality.As we gazed in silent delight at the broad expanse of the green-carpeted savanna, adorned with the graceful, columnar shafts and feathery fronds of the ever-beautiful, ever-majestic palm, we could easily fancy ourselves in the valley of the Euphrates or in the plains of Babylon, as described by Herodotus and Xenophon. And, without any effort of the imagination, we could descry, in a palm-shaded village in the vista before us, Jericho, as Moses saw it, when the Land of Promise was a land of palms, as well as a land of milk and honey, and when Judea was so prolific in palms that one of its representatives was chosen as the symbol of the country.24We dreamed of Zenobia’s fair capital, Palmyra—the city of Palms—of the land of the Nile, where Isis and Osiris carried palms as the symbol of their fecund power. We recalled the enthusiastic words of the ancient poets—Hebrew and Greek—in praise of the gracefulness and magnificence of the palm, and the plaintive elegy of Abdul Rhaman, first calif of Cordoba, who, exiled from Damascus, his home, thus addresses the date palm, that reminds him of the land of his birth: “Thou, also, beautiful palm, art here a stranger. The sweet zephyr of Algaraba descends and caresses thy beauty. Thou growest in this fertile soil and raisest thy crown to the skies. What bitter tears thou would’st shed, if, like me, thou hadst feeling!”25While thus musing on the glories of the past and contemplating the splendors of the present, which were passing in rapid succession before our enchanted vision, we instinctively repeated the words of the reverent poet-naturalist,Martius, who, contemplating the marvels of the tropical palm-world, expressed the depth of his emotion by the two words,Sursum corda—hearts heavenward!Just then our reveries were suddenly and unexpectedly interrupted.We had, early in the day, been congratulating ourselves on making our voyage down the river without delay and without accident. We were now within sight of Barranquilla and expected to land in less than an hour. We were in the full enjoyment of one of those delightful day-dreams that we always loved to indulge in, whenever Flora displayed before us, as she did then, her choicest treasures, when suddenly, without premonition of any kind, there was a violent lurch of the boat, a creaking and a crushing noise abaft, a quick stoppage of the engine, all of which indicated that something unusual, if not serious, had befallen our ill-fated craft. A hasty examination showed that the steamer had collided with a sunken tree, and that several of the float-boards of the stern-wheel had been loosened, or partially wrenched from their places. After considerable delay the boatmen were able so to repair the damage that we were able to continue on our journey, although at a reduced speed.Very shortly afterwards there was a second and a much severer crash. We had encountered another hidden tree. This time several of the float-boards were carried away from the wheel entirely, and the wheel itself was so racked that repair, while on the river, was quite impossible. Fortunately, as we were going down stream, we were able to float to the entrance of the canal that leads to the docks of Barranquilla. Here a crowd of stevedores from the town soon congregated. These men, mostly negroes, agreed, after some parleying, to haul the boat to the landing place. They, accordingly, took hold of a long rope, which was thrown ashore, and soon the disabled steamer was being conveyed to her moorings in the same fashion as a canal boat is drawn along by mules in tandem. Wereached the wharf the fifth day26after leaving Honda, just as the sun was setting, and when the customs officers were about to close their office for the night. They, however, kindly allowed us to disembark and we were soon on our way to a hotel.“How fortunate,” C. exclaimed, “that this accident did not occur midway up the river!” Such a mishap would have entailed much suffering and might have delayed our arrival at Barranquilla, for days, if not for weeks. And considering our happy escape from the detentions and disasters from which so many others had suffered, and the peculiar episode that characterized our last hours on the Magdalena, we were forcibly reminded of the words of Dante:—“Let not the people be too swift to judge.For I have seenA bark, that all her way across the seaRan straight and speedy, perish at the lastE’en in the haven’s mouth.”271“Hail, hail, majestic river!... Contemplating thee, adorned by the eldest of Earth’s sons; full only of thee, I feel my soul carried on by the foam of thy waves, which in deep whirlpools roar, absorbed in the giant works of that Being which embraces the infinite.”↑2The reader will be surprised to learn that the aggregate capacity of all the boats—champans included—at present plying on the Magdalena—proudly named by the people the Danube of Colombia—is not more than eleven thousand tons, about half the tonnage of one of our great transatlantic steamers.↑3Op. cit., 3a Noticia, Cap. IX.↑4The first mention, apparently, of the Magdalena, as distinguished from the Rio Grande, occurs in Benzoni’s work, already cited.↑5Called by the nativesCabeza de Negro—Negro-head—from the globular form of the spathe enclosing the nuts.↑6The introduction of the steamboat on the Magdalena will soon suppress the rude yet picturesque craft known as the champan. With it will disappear that interesting type of negro known as theboga. The boga is tall and robust, with the habits of a savage. He spends the greater part of his time in the champan, and his life as a punter is a strenuous one and full of danger. He speaks a barbarous jargon—currulao—composed of Spanish and of certain African and Indian dialects. His ideas of honor and honesty are not unlike those of similar people in other parts of the world. One can safely trust him with money and clothing, but, if the traveler have liquor of any kind with him, the boga will be sure to purloin it at the first opportunity. He is simple, frank, and brave. He sings during good weather, even while struggling against the current or fighting caymans, but he swears like a trooper during rain and thunder storms, especially when the lightning strikes near him. For him death is a very simple matter. A dead man to him is like a champan damaged beyond repair—something to be carried away by the all-devouring river.↑7The exact altitudes of the points named are as follows:—Cumbre Pass, between Chile and Argentina, 12,505 feet; Crucero Alto, between Arequipa and Lake Titicaca, 14,666 feet; Galera Tunnel, 15,665 feet. At Urbina, on the recently-completed railroad between Guayaquil and Quito, the height above sea level is 11,841 feet.↑8In Colombia, the white race, composed of the descendants of the conquistadores, most of whom have intermarried with the indigenous tribes, constitutes fifty per cent of the population. The negroes compose thirty-five and the Indians fifteen per cent. In Venezuela the descendants of Europeans are in the minority, while in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia the indigenes make up nearly two-thirds of the inhabitants.La Republique de Colombie, p. 44, par Ricardo Nuñez et Henry Jalahay, Bruxelles, 1898.↑9Albert Millican,Travels and Adventures of an Orchid Hunter, p. 118, London, 1891.↑10The noted English botanist, Spruce, expresses a similar idea when he writes, “I like to look on plants as sentient beings, which live and enjoy their lives—which beautify the earth during life, and after death may adorn my herbarium.”—Notes of a Botanist, and the Amazon and Andes, Chap. XXXIX, by Richard Spruce, London, 1908.↑11The route followed by Quesada from the Magdalena to the plateau of Bogotá has remained impassable for horses since the time of the conquest. To one familiar with the difficulties of the way, it seems impossible that so small a body of soldiers should ever have been able to take sixty horses with them and bring them all, with a single exception, in safety to the plains above. It may be safely doubted if such a feat could be accomplished now. But “there were giants in those days.”↑12The fact that the Spaniards found potatoes here on their arrival, and the further fact that there was never any communication, so far as known, between New Granada and Chile before the conquest, would seem to indicate that theSolanum tuberosummay have been, contrary to the opinion of Humboldt and De Candolle, indigenous to Colombia.↑13Op. cit., Dec. I, Book X.↑14Quesada’s infantry received as their share of the spoil, which had been secured, the equivalent of about $1,000. The cavalry received twice this amount.↑15In the province of Sinu the amount of treasure in gold and jewels secured in one day amounted to $300,000. Not without reason, then, was this part of the New World designated by the early geographers,Castilla del Oro—Golden Castile.↑16The Republic of Colombia, p. 59, London, 1906.Nothing is farther from my mind than to call in question the veracity of distinguished naturalists and travelers regarding any statements they may have made concerning the vast numbers of animals and birds seen by them in the equinoctial regions of South America. But my experience proves at least one thing and that is that one may travel a long time in the very heart of the tropics, and see very little of its fauna, even in those parts in which it is generally supposed that there are always representatives of many kinds and that, too, in great numbers.↑17The following sentence affords an interesting commentary on the occasional rarity of certain animals which are usually supposed to be always visible in large numbers, especially in the Magdalena.“I have read much of the number of alligators on the Magdalena, but have not seen one.”—The Journal of an Expedition Across Venezuela and Colombia, p. 264, 1906–7, by Hiram Bingham, New Haven. 1909.Raleigh says he saw in Guiana thousands of these “vglie serpants” calledLagartos.↑18Mr. R. L. Ditmars, Curator of Reptiles in the New York Zoological Park, in his interesting work,The Reptile Book, writes as follows of the crocodile: “The sight of a child will send a twelve-foot specimen rushing from its basking place for the water, and a man may even bathe in safety in rivers frequented by the species. The dangerous ‘man-eating’ crocodiles inhabit India and Africa.” P. 91. Compare Schomburgk, inRaleigh’s Discovery of Guiana, p. 57.↑19If the slaughter of the alligator in the Gulf States continues for a few years longer, at the rate which has prevailed during the past few decades, the reptile will be exterminated. According to theBulletin of the U. S. Fish Commission, XI, 1891, p. 343, it is estimated that 2,500,000 were killed in Florida between 1880 and 1894.↑20Dec. II, Book 9.↑21Dec. I, Book 9.↑22TheCeroxylon andicolaand theKunthia montanagrow at altitudes of from 6,000 to 9,000 feet, and, according to Humboldt, palms are found in the Paramo de Guanucos, 13,000 feet above sea level.↑23Historia Naturalis Palmarum, Tom. I, p. 156, Lipsiæ. 1850.↑24The countries here mentioned, especially Palestine, are now comparatively bare of palms.↑25According to a legend, this was the first date-palm seen in Spain, and was planted by the calif himself, in front of his palace, as a souvenir of his early home.↑26Quesada and his companions made their celebrated voyage from Guatiqui to the mouth of the river, a distance of nearly seven hundred miles, in twelve days. Considering that they had only rudely-constructed brigantines and dugouts, their trip, compared with ours made in a steamboat under the most favorable conditions in but little less than half the time, was truly remarkable.↑27Paradiso, Canto XIII, 130 et 136–138.↑

CHAPTER XIITHE VALLEY OF THE MAGDALENA“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...Al contemplar tu frente coronadaDe los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,Lleno solo de ti, siento mi almaArrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,Que entre profundos remolinos braman,De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1—Manuel M. Madiedo.

“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...Al contemplar tu frente coronadaDe los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,Lleno solo de ti, siento mi almaArrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,Que entre profundos remolinos braman,De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1—Manuel M. Madiedo.

“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...Al contemplar tu frente coronadaDe los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,Lleno solo de ti, siento mi almaArrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,Que entre profundos remolinos braman,De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1

“Salud, Salud, majestuoso rio!...

Al contemplar tu frente coronada

De los hijos mas viejos de la tierra,

Lleno solo de ti, siento mi alma

Arrastrada en la espuma de tus olas,

Que entre profundos remolinos braman,

De aquel gran ser que el infinito abraza.”1

—Manuel M. Madiedo.

While in Guaduas we met a Scotch engineer, who was superintendent of a gold mine in the mountains west of Honda. Desiring to know the truth about the excessive temperature of this place, about which we had heard so many reports, we asked him if it was really true that the heat in Honda was as intense as represented.“You will,” he said, “find it the hottest place you have ever visited. It is certainly the most torrid place I know, and I have been something of a globe-trotter in my time. Hades, if I have caught the meaning of the word, as used in the Revised Version, is quite temperate in comparison with it. Business frequently calls me to Bogotá, and, on my way thither, I must necessarily pass through Honda, but I never stop there longer than is absolutely necessary, and I always try to avoid being there in the daytime. If I must stop there for a few hours, I time my journey so as to arrive there at night, and make it a point to leave before morning. Hot? I think it is the hottest and most suffocatingspot on earth. It has always been a mystery to me how people can live there at all. I know of nothing to compare it with except one of the burning pits of Dante’s Inferno.”Had we not learned by long experience how to discount such statements, the prospect of spending some days in a town with such a reputation for grilling the stranger within its gates, would have been anything but inviting. But we had heard similar reports about the llanos and the valley of the Orinoco, and had found, on arriving in these regions, that the temperature said to prevail there had been greatly exaggerated. The same we found to be true of Honda. During our sojourn there, our thermometer never registered more than 86° F. in the shade. Of course, around midday it was uncomfortable in the sun, but I have been in many places in the United States where I suffered more from the heat than I did in Honda.The town is about seven hundred feet above sea level and counts nearly four thousand inhabitants. It is separated into two parts by the river Guali, which here enters the Magdalena. Being the centre of traffic for Bogotá, the upper Magdalena, and the mining district round about Mariquita, it is a place of considerable importance. As soon, however, as the Colombian National Railway, now nearing completion, shall have connected Girardot with Bogotá, Honda will lose the commercial supremacy it has maintained for nearly three centuries. There will then be little reason for a town in this place, and it will lapse into a straggling village similar to many others along the river.And the Muisca Trail, over which we had so delightful a ride, will be no longer needed, and will soon disappear in the dense and rank vegetation through which it passes. Then, too, will disappear those long and picturesque mule-trains, that so often crowded us to the roadside on our way from Bogotá, and which have been almost the sole means employed for the transportation of freight and passengers since the capital was founded by Quesada nearly four centuriesago. We shall always congratulate ourselves that we were able to make the trip on mule-back rather than by a railway train. We can thus feel that we have, to a great extent, seen the country as it was in colonial times—before its character was modified by the innovations of modern progress and the introduction of modern inventions.In 1805 Honda was visited by a terrific earthquake, from the effects of which it has never recovered. Everywhere are evidences of the frightful cataclysm. Some of the largest and most important structures are still in ruins. Nor has any attempt ever been made to restore certain quarters of the town to their prior condition.After a few days’ halt at Honda, we were ready to continue our journey towards the Caribbean. The rapids of the Magdalena make it impracticable for steamers to ascend the river as far as the town. For this reason, it is necessary to go by rail to La Dorada, eighteen miles northwards. But, although the distance is so short, it takes two hours for the train to make the run. The road, however, passes through a picturesque country and time passes pleasantly and quickly. Before one realizes it, one is at La Dorada, where the transfer is made to the steamer bound for Barranquilla.There are several lines of steamboats plying between La Dorada and Barranquilla and intermediate points. But all the boats, which are stern-wheelers, are quite small. The largest of them will not carry more than four hundred tons. Usually the tonnage is much less—not more than one or two hundred tons.2Our boat, which was recommended as the best and the most comfortable on the river, was one of the largest and newest, but, if it was the best, it is difficult to conceive what the others must have been.A glance was sufficient to convince us that the craft on the Magdalena are in every way inferior to those on the Orinoco and its affluents. The Venezuelan boats are larger, and with incomparably better equipment and appointments. They are clean, well kept, and the service is good. Their cabins are commodious and well ventilated. They are, besides, provided with all necessary furniture and the berths are as comfortable as could be desired.But how different is it on the Magdalena boats! In the cabins, in place of berths with neat bedding, there is a bare cot, usually of questionable cleanliness. Each passenger is supposed to supply his own bedding. As to lavatories and bathrooms, those that we saw were filthy beyond description. Our stewards were half-dressed, barefooted, slovenly, unwashed negro boys, who seemed to have been picked up on the streets at random, just before the boat left its moorings. The cuisine and service were in keeping with everything else, and left very much room for improvement. The natives, having nothing better, seemed to be satisfied with the conditions that obtained. The foreigners, however, and there were representatives of several nationalities aboard, could never become reconciled to the lack of so many things essential to comfortable traveling, and were always glad when their river experiences were at an end.For ourselves, who had been roughing it so long, the trip down the river was not so trying as it was for many others. We were, besides, better prepared for such a journey than the other passengers. We had our camping outfits with us, together with clean bedding, which had received the attention of the laundress before we left Bogotá. We had, besides, good cumare hammocks, and mosquito nets, so that we had nothing to apprehend from filth, vermin or insects. Thus equipped, we really enjoyed our voyage on the Magdalena, but we were probably the only ones who did.After we had gotten fairly started down stream, andcould contemplate at our leisure the rich tropical vegetation that fringed both banks, our minds reverted to the first trip made down this river by Europeans. The travelers were the celebrated conquistadores, of whom mention has already been made, viz., Quesada, Belalcazar and Federmann. They embarked with a number of soldiers at Guataqui, a short distance above Honda. But they had scarcely started on their downward course, before they encountered the rapids at the mouth of the Guali. They were then obliged to unload their two brigantines and canoes and transport their contents to the lower part of the cataract, whence, after reloading, they were able to proceed again on their long journey to Cartagena.It was while passing this point that Quesada learned from his Indian boatmen of the existence of gold in the valley of the Guali. In consequence of this information, the town of Marquita was founded without delay, and has ever since been a mining centre of considerable importance. It was in this place that Quesada died after his return from Spain. From here his remains were transferred to the Cathedral of Bogotá, where they still repose.According to Padre Simon, Quesada and his companions were frequently, during their journey down the river, attacked by Indians, “who came out to salute them and speed their way with a shower of poisoned arrows.” “With the help of God,” he continues, “joined to eternal vigilance, their own valor and a liberal supply of powder and firearms with which the soldiers of Belalcazar were provided, they were able finally to arrive at Cartagena, and give the first information regarding the great campaign in which Quesada and his followers had achieved such signal success.”3The Magdalena, like many other water courses in South America, was at first known as the Rio Grande—the great river. It was subsequently given the name it now bearsin honor of St. Mary Magdalene.4At times it is comparatively narrow and deep. Then navigation is easy and without danger. At other times,“Shallow, disreputable, vastIt spreads across the western plains.”Then progress is difficult, and the boat may run into a sand bar at any moment. And if the river should then be falling, it may be impossible to get the craft free until the water rises. Only a short time before our trip one of the steamers had been held in a sand bank for forty days. As it was not near any place where provisions could be obtained, the passengers suffered greatly from hunger, not to speak of the suspense and enforced detention on an uncomfortable boat.Owing to the shallowness of the river, the boat was, during the first part of the voyage, always tied up for the night at the first tree or stump that might be found on the bank at sunset. The following morning we were supposed to resume our journey at daybreak, but, as the firemen did not begin to get up steam before that time, it was usually an hour after sunrise before we were under way. We stopped at every village and warehouse along the river, sometimes to deliver the mail, often consisting of only a single letter or package, or to take on a passenger. Two or three times a day, also, we halted to take on wood to supply the furnace with fuel, for here, as on the Meta, coal is not used. Fortunately, we were never obliged, as on the Meta, to delay until the wood could be cut. Large wood piles are found every few miles all along the river. They usually belong to a negro, who has a hut or shed near by, together with a small garden and a few domestic animals which supply him and his family with food in their sequestered home.We stopped at several large warehouses, many of themconstructed of corrugated iron from the United States. This seems strange in a land where timber is so abundant. But there are no sawmills in the Magdalena valley. South of Barranquilla—where but little lumber is produced—imported lumber would be more expensive and less durable than iron. At these places the chief articles of merchandise are coffee, cacao, hides and vegetable ivory. This last product, also called ivory nuts, is the fruit of a species of palm known asPhytelephas macrocarpa,5and constitutes, in this part of Colombia, an important article of commerce. For many things it is a good substitute for elephant ivory, which it rivals in whiteness, beauty and solidity, and collecting it for shipment gives occupation to quite a number of the poor inhabitants of the Magdalena valley.We usually went ashore at the different landing places to see the people and familiarize ourselves with their mode of life. It was generally as simple and primitive as possible—almost as primitive, in some instances, as we conceive it to have been in the Quaternary period or in the days of the Troglodytes. Often their dwellings were little more than palm-thatched sheds—barely sufficient to shield their occupants from sun and rain. Atulpa, consisting of three stones, served them in lieu of a stove, and on this they broiled the fish caught in the river, or prepared theirarepas—corn cakes—or theirsancocho, a kind of ragout, as popular in some parts of Colombia as it is in Venezuela.We were surprised to see in the houses and shops along the Magdalena valley—what we had often observed in various parts of Colombia and Venezuela—the large number of illustrated circulars of Spanish, English and French proprietary medicines. The insides of certain houses were sometimes quite plastered over with them. But what was more surprising was the number of lithographs we saw ofthe German Emperor. Sometimes he was represented alone, at others he was depicted as surrounded by the members of his family. In several places we saw pictures not only of the emperor and his family, but also those of his father and grandfather and Bismarck. And the remarkable thing about it was that, in some cases, there were no Germans living within hundreds of miles of where we came across these pictures. Had some enthusiastic Teuton tried to start a propaganda in favor of the Vaterland by distributing broadcast these engravings of the imperial family? I know not, but, judging solely from the number of their pictures we came across in Venezuela and Colombia, one would be led to suppose that the Hohenzollern rulers are the most popular of potentates, at least in this part of South America.While stopping to take on some rubber at a certain small village, we had a remarkable illustration of the rapidity with which the bed of the river is sometimes changed, even when the water is comparatively low. We had scarcely reached the landing place when there was a terrific crash, occasioned by the falling in of a large section of the bank on which the village was built. Soon afterwards another section gave way, and then a third and a fourth. The whole bank seemed to be undermined by the river, and, although the warehouse was fully fifty feet away from the water when we arrived, so much of the bank had been carried away in less than half an hour, that not only the contents of the building, but also the building itself had to be hurriedly removed in order that it and the merchandise stored within might not be borne away by the resistless current. As the structure was of light bamboo, and put together with a view to such an emergency, the transfer was not a difficult task. When we started to continue our course, it looked as if the eroding action of the river would necessitate the changing of the site of the entire village before nightfall.Such changes in the course of the river are not uncommon.They are going on all the time in some part or other of the valley. One may frequently see immense masses of earth suddenly detached, which are a serious menace to the champans6—large covered flat-boats—and other small craft that happen to pass by at the time. Sometimes the giants of the forest are thus wrested from their footholds, and may be seen drifting down stream together with masses of vegetation attached to them. At times, too, masses of earth, like floating islets, are visible, and may travel a long distance down stream before their course is arrested by an island or a sand bar.Ordinarily the changes in the river bed are gradual and occasion little danger to life or property. Sometimes, however, during the rainy season, and when the flood is unusually high, widespread devastation is the result. Whole villages are swept away by the deluge; and towns, that were before important commercial centres, are suddenly isolated and left far from the navigable part of the river. Places that before were favorably situated are, after the flood, found to be in the midst of pestiferous morasses. Such has been the fate of many places along the waterways of Colombia, but more notably in the great island of Mompos, near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena. Here several places that were at onetime centres of industrial and agricultural activity, have long since either ceased to exist or lost entirely their pristine importance.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.The town of Mompos is probably the most remarkable example of this kind. Founded in 1539 by Alonso de Heredia, it is one of the oldest towns in the republic, and was for generations the most important commercial centre between Cartagena and Honda. But owing to a displacement of the main channel of the river, and the filling in of the branch of the river on which the town was built, it is now practically deprived of its former means of communication with the rest of the country, and is rapidly verging towards extinction.The Magdalena, as a commercial highway, has been much neglected. As a consequence, no one can calculate when leaving Honda, how long it will take him to reach Barranquilla. It may require five or six days, or it may demand twice that much time. All depends on the shifting bed of the river, or the blocking of the channel by sand bars and accumulations of floating timber. By reason of these obstructions and the ever-varying depth of the main channel, navigation is usually impossible at night, except below the island of Mompos, where the volume of water is swelled by the tribute of the mighty Cauca.If the Magdalena were under the supervision of a corps of competent engineers, having at their disposal the necessary dredges and other appliances for keeping the main channel in prime condition, a properly constructed boat would easily make the trip from Honda to the mouth of the river in two days, and traverse the same course up stream in three days at most. It is really a pity to see such a splendid water course so neglected. If cared for as it should be, it could easily be rendered an artery for inland commerce of the first importance. As it is, transportation, as now carried on, is always slow and uncertain, and never free from danger and disaster.As a serviceable means of communication with the outside world we were constantly contrasting the Magdalena with the Meta. From our observations, we should consider the Meta, from its junction with the Orinoco to Cabuyaro or even to the mouth of the Humea, as a safer waterway than the Magdalena. Only twice did our boat graze a sand bank in the Meta, but it continued its course without a moment’s stoppage. In the Magdalena, however, we frequently ran into sand bars, or shallow water, and, on several occasions, had difficulty in extricating and floating our craft. Once we were delayed for some time, and began to fear that, owing to the falling water, we should be stranded for weeks, as other boats had been not long before.When peace shall have been firmly established in Colombia, and its finances shall have been placed on a satisfactory basis, the patriotic and far-seeing statesmen of the republic, will, I am convinced, see the necessity of carrying out the plan of the former Archbishop and Viceroy of New Granada—Don Antonio Caballero y Gongora—and connecting Bogotá with Europe by means of the Meta and the Orinoco. It will not be a difficult feat of engineering to build a railroad from the capital to a suitable point on the Meta, and the length of such a road need not exceed one hundred and fifty miles at most. This will bring Bogatá within eight or ten hours of the head waters of navigation, and develop the most valuable and most productive grazing section of the country.The highest point the road need reach in crossing the Eastern Cordilleras will be less than that of several passes in Colorado, where the Rocky Mountains are scaled by the iron-horse with a long train of cargo behind him. The pass of Chipaque, by which we entered thealtiplaniciesof Bogotá, is several thousand feet lower than the heights crossed by the railways leading from the waters of the Pacific to Lake Titicaca, and to Argentina by way of Cumbre Pass, and is nearly a mile lower than the pointwhere the Galera tunnel pierces the Cordillera on the way from Lima to Oroya.7What Colombia really needs is the betterment of both its great waterways—the Meta for the eastern and the Magdalena for the western part of the republic. Until they shall both have been put in such condition as to be navigable during the entire year, it will be impossible fully to develop the marvelous resources of this extensive country. River traffic will always remain cheaper than traffic by rail, and, on account of many physical difficulties, it is highly improbable that certain valuable sections of territory will ever be tapped by railroads. When, however, these two main arteries of commerce shall have received the attention they deserve and shall have been put in communication with the rich grazing, mining and agricultural regions by the various lines of railway that are contemplated or in course of construction, Colombia will at once take a position among the richest and most flourishing republics of South America. Only those who have traveled through it can fully realize its wonderful natural riches, or form an adequate conception of its vast extent. Sufficient to state that its area is more than ten times as great as the state of New York, or as great as that of France, Germany and the British Isles combined.As to the great Pan-American line which has been projected to connect New York with Buenos Ayres, that is talked of in Colombia as well as in the United States. But when one contemplates the enormous engineering difficulties to be encountered in the construction of the section extending from Costa Rica to the frontier of Ecuador, one is compelled to regard the project as a much more arduous undertaking than some of its enthusiastic promoters would have us believe. Railway communication will soon be completefrom Buenos Ayres to Central Peru, and, judging by work now being accomplished in Ecuador, steel rails will soon span the country from the northern to the southern boundaries of this republic. But with all this work completed, the most difficult part of the colossal enterprise will still remain untouched. Even should the road eventually be completed, as is possible, it is still doubtful whether long stretches of it would ever pay even a nominal interest on the investment.The part of the Magdalena valley between Honda and the island of Mompos is but sparsely inhabited. Most of the inhabitants are Indians, mestizos, or negroes, the descendants of former slaves.8On account of the heat and malaria that always prevail in the lowlands, but few white men are found here, and their sojourn, as a rule, is only temporary. But near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena, and thence to the Caribbean, there are rich and extensiveesteros—grazing lands—covered with succulent Para and Guinea grasses, several feet high. In these broad plains, there are no fewer than half a million cattle, not to speak of large numbers of horses, mules and other domestic animals. Some of the cattle we saw reminded us of the fat, sleek animals we had seen on the llanos watered by the Rio Negro and the Humea. Under more favorable conditions the number could greatly be increased.The scenery along the Magdalena is much like that along the Meta and the Orinoco, except that along the western river one sees more of the mountains, especially in the southern part. The vegetation is similar in character and quite as varied and exuberant. On both sides of the river trees and bushes are so massed together as toform an impenetrable wall. Everywhere there is a veritable maze of creeping plants, of bromelias, bignonias, passifloras. And everywhere, too, are lianas—aptly named monkey-ladders—which bind tree to tree and branch to branch. Usually they are single, like ropes—whence their name bush ropes—but often they are twined together like strands in a cable. Frequently they are seen descending from the topmost part of a tree to the ground, where they forthwith strike root and present the appearance of the stays and shrouds of a ship’s main mast. And where there is air and sunshine, these lianas, which often form bights like ropes, are loaded with epiphytes of all kinds, and decorated with the rarest and most beautiful orchids. Indeed, the regions on both sides of the Magdalena have long been favorite resorts for the orchid hunters in the employ of the florists and merchant princes of the United States and Europe. From here these bizarre vegetable forms are shipped by thousands. One enthusiastic English collector tells us how he secured, as the result of two months’ work about ten thousand plants of the highly prizedOdontoglossum. But to obtain these orchids he was obliged to fell some four thousand trees.“The most magnificent sight,” he writes, “for even the most stoical observer, is the immense clumps ofCattleya Mendelii, each new bulb bearing four or five of its gorgeous rose-colored flowers, many of them growing in the full sun, or with very little shade, and possessing a glowing color which is very difficult to get in the stuffy hothouses where the plants are cultivated. Some of these plants, considering their size and the slowness of growth, must have taken many years to develop, for I have taken plants from the trees with five hundred bulbs, and as many as one hundred spikes of flowers, which, to a lover of orchids, is a sight worth traveling from Europe to see.”9It is when contemplating the marvelous variety andluxuriance of intertropical flora—of which one in our northern climes can have no adequate conception—that one is tempted to exclaim with Wordsworth:—“It is my faith, that every flowerEnjoys the air it breathes.”10And if the extraordinary claims which Professors Wagner, France and G. H. Darwin make for plants be true, viz., that they have minds and are conscious of their existence, that they feel pain and have memories, then, indeed, should we be disposed to regard the exuberant and wondrously developed plants of the equatorial world as occupying the highest plane in the evolutionary process of vegetable life.Passing the embouchure of the Opon, on the right bank of the Magdalena, evoked, in a special manner, memories of Quesada and his valiant band. It was here they left the Magdalena during that memorable expedition that made them the undisputed masters of the country now known as Colombia. More than eight months had passed since they had started from Santa Marta on their career of discovery and conquest. The difficulties they had to encounter and the sufferings they had to endure were extreme. Mosquitoes, wasps, ants and other insects; reptiles and jaguars gave them no rest, day or night. Certain kinds of worms, the old chroniclers tell us, buried themselves in the flesh of the exhausted and half-famished men and caused them untold agony. Indians everywhere laid ambush for them, and assailed them with poisoned arrows from every point of vantage. Even the elements seemed to conspire against them. There was a continual downpour of rain, so that it was impossible to light a fire for any purpose. Their arms were almost destroyed by rust, and they were left withouta single dry charge of powder. Their provisions became exhausted and starvation stared them in the face. To preserve life they devoured their sword scabbards and every article of leather they had with them. There was incessant thunder, unchanging gloom, eternal horror, and other features of the pit infernal. Their course was through dense underbrush and pestiferous swamps and up precipitous acclivities, whither they had to drag their weakened horses by long lianas that served the purpose of ropes.11Finally, after the most heroic efforts, they came to a place where they found provisions—a veritable land of promise for the suffering but intrepid Spaniards. They had left behind them the inhospitable sierras of the Opon, and were on the verge of the fertile plateau of Cundinamarca, that constituted the home of the Muiscas. Here they found maize, potatoes,12yucas, beans, tomatoes and, as Padre Simon phrases it, “a thousand otherchucherias—titbits—of the aborigines.” Well could they, in the language of Castellanos, exclaim, with thanksgiving:“A good land! A good land! A land which puts an end to our suffering, a land of gold, a land of plenty. A land for a home, a land of benediction, bright and serene.”It was then that the enthusiastic soldiers, whose courage would often have faltered, had it not been for the determination and perseverance of their invincible leader, gathered around Quesada to congratulate him on the successful issueof his great undertaking, and to assure him of their undying loyalty in any future enterprise in which he might require their services.And well they might render the noble licentiate the meed of praise he so well deserved, for had it not been for him, the expedition would have been a failure, and they would undoubtedly have perished before they could have returned to Santa Marta, as had so many of their companions, who had turned back before the ascent of the Cordillera was begun. To some of his officers who, in view of the unheard-of difficulties they had to encounter, recommended that the expedition be abandoned, he replied that he would regard as a personal enemy any one who, in future, would make such a pusillanimous proposal and one so foreign to Spanish valor.All in all, he was one of the bravest and most humane of the conquistadores, and successfully performed a task before which a less valorous commander would have given up in despair. His achievements obscure by their brilliancy and daring those of Amadis and Roldan and are in no wise inferior to those of any of the conquistadores. They may truthfully, in the words of Bacon, written anent a performance of Sir Richard Grenville, be styled as “memorable beyond credit, and to the height of some heroical fable.”Quesada has taken his place in Valhalla among the greatest of the world’s heroes, and his memory will endure as long as splendid deeds of prowess shall stir the souls of men. Of him and his gallant companions one can say what Peter Martyr wrote of their countrymen in general:—“Wherefore, the Spanyardes in these owre dayes and theyr noble enterpryses, doo not gyue place eyther to the factes of Saturnus, or Hercules, or any other of the ancient princes of famous memorie, which werecanonizedamonge the goddes cauled Heroes for theyr searchinge of newe landes, and regions, and bringinge the same to better culture and ciuilitie.”13Lower down the Magdalena, on the left bank of the river, we approached the scene of the exploits of another of the distinguished conquistadores—Pedro de Heredia, the founder of Cartagena. After he had reduced to submission the Indians who had been victorious over Ojeda, he started towards the Magdalena, where he collected such immense treasures of gold that when it was divided, each soldier received no less than 6,000 ducats. This was the equivalent of $48,000 in gold at the present valuation of this metal, and was the largest apportionment of spoil, at least, so far as private soldiers were concerned, made during the conquest.14He afterwards made a similar expedition to the territories drained by the San Jorge and the Nechi, affluents of the Cauca, in search of the rich veins whence the Indians extracted their gold. He did not find the objects of his quest, but came across several rich cemeteries, in which the dead had been interred with their jewels, and a sanctuary with idols adorned with plates of gold. From these he secured treasures to the amount of more than $3,000,000 of our money.15Strange as it may seem, the method Heredia resorted to of securing gold, the rifling of thehuacas—burial places—of the aborigines, has been continued until the present day. There are still men in Colombia, notably in Antioquia—huaqueros, they are called—who gain a livelihood by searching for huacas and extracting from them the gold and emeralds they frequently contain.The year before our trip there appeared in an English magazine, the following paragraph in an article purporting to give a picture of the Magdalena valley and its life:—“Anchored in the forest at midnight, the traveler hearsthe deep growl of the jaguar, the sharp squeal of the wild cat, the howl of the howler monkey, the long moan of the sloth, and the last scream of the wild pig, pierced by the claws of some patient but ferocious animal ambushed during the past hour, with many other sounds of life, terror and conflict that fall strangely on the European ear, and, if he waits and watches until the dawn, he may see the alligator dragging his ugly bulk out of the water, crowds of turtles trailing on the sands, the deer and the tapir coming down to drink, thousands of white cranes on the branches nearest to their prey, thousands of gray ones already wading leg-deep, and many more thousands of other birds clouding the dim horizon, all waiting for the light ere they begin their work of life and slaughter.... With the alligators in shoals at the bottom of the river, and the millions of birds above its surface, one wonders how any fish are left, yet the river is always literally teeming with fish, as though conscious of the demands it has to meet.”Although we were always on the alert, so as to miss nothing of interest, especially anything that concerned the animal life of the tropics, we must confess that in all our experience we never heard growls, squeals, howls, moans, screams, or other sounds of terror and conflict, either along the Magdalena or anywhere else in South America. And we spent nearly a year in the country, and often traveled weeks at a time in the wild virgin forest, far away from human habitations of every kind. Nor did we ever perceive any of the animals that certain tourists would lead one to believe can be seen in such numbers everywhere, even from the deck of a passing steamer. Nowhere along the Orinoco, the Meta, the Magdalena, or elsewhere, did we ever catch even a glimpse of a jaguar or a puma, a manati or a sloth, a wild cat or a wild pig. More than this, not once, during our entire trip through Venezuela and Colombia, through forests and plains, did we ever see a single monkey, except two or three that were kept as petsby the natives. This may seem an incredible statement. I would have believed such an experience as ours to be absolutely impossible, especially in view of what writers and travelers in South America have told us regarding the immense number of wild animals of all kinds everywhere visible in equatorial wilds. But I am stating a fact that I am quite unable to reconcile with the contrary experiences of others who, according to their own admission, have seen but little, compared with what we saw, of the lands through which we passed. I have seen more large game on the plains of New Mexico and Wyoming, from the window of a Pullman car, in a single trip to and from the Pacific coast, than I ever saw in the wilds of South America during nearly a twelvemonth.Nor did we ever see along the Magdalena, or anywhere else, the “thousands of white cranes on branches,” nor the “thousands of gray ones wading leg-deep,” nor the “many more thousands clouding the dim horizon,” of which the writer of the above-mentioned article professes to have been the fortunate spectator. We rarely saw more than a few dozen cranes at a time—never a hundred, and I have reason to believe we enjoyed very favorable opportunities, at least during a portion of our long journey, for seeing what was to be seen. At no time did we ever observe as many birds in the air at one time as I have frequently seen in the United States. I feel safe in asserting positively that the number of wild pigeons I have frequently noted in a single flock in the United States, would more than equal that of all the birds combined that we saw while in the tropics.Mr. F. Lorraine Petre evidently had an experience somewhat similar to ours. In his recent work on Colombia, he tells us frankly that one sees little of animal life on the Magdalena, that “of the mammalia one sees and hears little.... Of the jaguars, the pumas, the sloths, the peccaries, the deer, the tapirs, and other animals, dangerous or harmless, we saw or heard as little as we did of the bears which inhabit the hills beyond. It is surprisingthat, tied up, as we often were, right against the forest, we should not have heard the night call of the carnivora, or the sharp bark of the frightened deer, but truth compels us to admit that we did not, and, moreover, that the cry of even the howling monkey did not salute us.”16The number of birds observed along the Magdalena was not greater than I have frequently seen in the valleys of the Missouri or the Columbia. Most of these were parrots and macaws. Always noisy and restless, always flying and climbing about, except when eating fruit or cracking nuts, one is at times tempted to describe them as feathered relatives of the monkey. The parrots are sometimes seen in flocks, and their piercing cries are at times almost deafening. They are a sociable bird and are usually seen in considerable numbers. The macaws are remarkable for always flying in pairs, and for their brilliant colors. Their body is flaming scarlet, their wings are tinged with various shades of red, yellow, green and blue, while their tail is bright blue and scarlet. They, too, like parrots, are very vociferous, and, although they may occasionally be found in large numbers, they always fly two and two.The large animals most frequently seen along the Magdalena, as along other tropical rivers, are those horrid monsters, “ambiguous between sea and land,” the cayman and “the scaly crocodile.” But even they are not so numerous as certain travelers would have us believe. The largest number we ever saw at one time was fifteen. They were sunning themselves on aplaya—sand bank—below the island of Mompos. On the Orinoco and the Meta we never beheld more than eight at any one time—unless wewere to count a number of little ones, just hatched, which Luisito, our colored boy, caught one day while we were taking on wood on the lower Meta.17The early Spaniards called all these saurians by the general name oflagartos—lizards. The English afterwards spoke of a single animal as a lagarto, whence the present name alligator. Modern writers speak of them indiscriminately as alligators or crocodiles. As a matter of fact, several species of both alligators and crocodiles are found in the equatorial regions. But, notwithstanding all that has hitherto been written about them, their distinction and definition, their classification still remains a matter of difficulty. Some specimens have been found whose classification is so perplexing that naturalists are still undecided whether to regard them as crocodiles or alligators. In this respect they are much like Shakespeare’s two lovers, “Two distincts, division none.”The name cayman is employed in Venezuela and Colombia to designate any of these saurians. Following the classification adopted in the British Museum the cayman is distinct from both alligator and crocodile. More than this. According to the British system of classification, there are no alligators at all in South America, while, in the waters of Colombia and Venezuela, there are two species of crocodile and three species of cayman.Probably more fabulous accounts have obtained about crocodiles than about any other animal. In spite of the old saying to the contrary, they never shed tears. And notwithstanding the fact that the ancient Egyptians gave the crocodile divine honors, because, being tongueless, it wasmade in hieroglyphical writing, a symbol of the Divinity, it is now known that the tongue of this erstwhile god is quite large, except at the tip. Similarly, all the stories that have so long been current about the impenetrability of the animal’s hide, are quite without foundation. How often have we not been told that it is impossible to kill a crocodile, with even the best Winchester, unless the ball enter the eye or strike under the soft, fleshy parts of the front legs? Their plated skin is easily pierced by an ordinary rifle or revolver, and a mortal wound ensues whenever a vital part is penetrated.Not less erroneous are the ideas that so widely prevail regarding the ferocity of the crocodile and the cayman. On the contrary, they are, in their native state, very timid animals, and rarely exhibit hostility towards man, except when cornered. Then, like most other animals, they will fight with great fierceness. They make for the water as soon as they see one approach them, and it is often far from easy to get near them. We often saw the natives enter rivers frequented by crocodiles and caymans, something they surely would not have done if the danger were as great as ordinarily imagined. In Venezuela the Indian or mestizo has a much greater dread of the ray or carib fish than of the cayman.18Some attempts have been made, both on the Orinoco and the Magdalena, to secure the hides of crocodiles and caymans for commercial purposes, but the expense of preparing them for the market proved to be so great that the work had to be abandoned.19The early explorers of the New World had many stories to tell about the cayman and the crocodile, and many of them have apparently survived among the natives until the present day. But there were many other animals that made even a greater impression on them. It will suffice to reproduce Peter Martyr’s quaint account of two of these representatives of the American fauna. The first is the tapir, of which he writes as follows:—“But there is especially one beast engendered here, in which nature hath endeuoured to shew her cunnyng. This beaste is as bygge as an oxe, armed with a longe snoute lyke an elephant, and yet no elephant. Of the colour of an oxe and yet noo oxe. With the houfe of a horse, and yet noo horse. With eares also much lyke vnto an elephant, but not soo open nor soo much hangying downe: yet much wyder then the eares of any other beaste.”20The other animal that excited the wonder of Martyr and his contemporaries was the sloth, of which he says:— “Emonge these trees is fownde that monstrous beaste with a snowte lyke a foxe, a tayle lyke a marmasette, eares lyke a batte, handes lyke a man, and feete lyke an ape, bearing her whelpes abowte with her in an owtwarde bellye much lyke vnto a greate bagge or purse. The dead carkas of this beaste, you sawe with me, and turned it ouer and ouer with yowre owne handes, marueylynge at that newe belly and wonderful prouision of nature. They say it is knownen by experience, that shee neuer letteth her whelpes goo owte of that purse, except it be eyther to play, or to sucke, vntyl suche tyme that they bee able to gette theyr lyuing by them selues.”21The part of the valley below the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena was quite different from that above. The country contained more inhabitants, and the denseforests that had hitherto bordered the river gave place to broad savannas, on which grazed thousands of cattle, so buried in the Para and Guinea grasses, that frequently we could discern only their horns. Along the river banks were the estates of well-to-dohaciendados—some of them foreigners—and the villages, that before were extremely rare, became more numerous. The aspect of the country was less wild than that through which we had just passed, and betokened a certain measure of prosperity, at least so far as the grazing interests were concerned.We could now travel day and night, for the river was so deep that sand bars were no longer to be apprehended. And then we had the most delightful moonlight nights. The air was balmy and laden with an exquisite fragrance,“Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,”a constant invitation to repose anddolce far niente. The surpassing loveliness of the scene, the magic stillness of the vast solitude through which we were so peacefully gliding, the broad expanse of one of the world’s great rivers, the weird silhouettes cast by the passing palms on the moonlit waters—all these things contributed towards rendering our last night on the river a fitting finale to the others—all of which were in the highest degree enjoyable. Seated on the forward deck of our steamer, we could exclaim in the words of the choric song of Tennyson’sLotos-Eaters:—“How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,With half-shut eyes ever to seemFalling asleep in a half-dream!Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.”The following morning—our last day on the Magdalena—found us at Calamar. Here some of our fellow-passengers disembarked to take the train to Cartagena, sixty-five miles to the westward. From Calamar to Barranquilla,the chief northern terminus of river navigation, is sixty-six miles. This distance we expected to make in a few hours, but for reasons presently to be given, we were unexpectedly delayed within sight of Barranquilla, the goal that marked the completion of another important stage in our journey.Our last day on the Magdalena was a bright balmy one in June. We spent the entire time on the forward part of the upper deck, fanned by the delightful breezes that were wafted from the Caribbean. The river here has about the same width as has the Mississippi at New Orleans, but the scenery is far more attractive. It flows through a broad, level, grass-covered savanna, which extends beyond the limits of vision, and which is dotted here and there with small villages and flourishing haciendas. Some of the houses near the river banks have a most cozy appearance. They are almost embowered in a mass of flowers of every hue, and surrounded by lofty palms whose lovely emerald coronals were each a picture of rarest beauty.“These princes of the vegetable world” always had a peculiar fascination for us, no matter where we saw them. And during our long journey from the delta of the Orinoco they were never absent from view even for a single hour. When one species disappeared it was replaced by another, and thus they followed us from the Atlantic wave to the lofty crest of Suma Paz. The ocean-loving cocoa gave place to the moriche, and this was in turn succeeded by the corneto of the llanos and the wax palm of the Sierras.22It is quite impossible for the inhabitants of our northern climes to have anything approaching an adequate conception of the grace and beauty and surpassing loveliness of the omnipresent palms of the equatorial world. Awayfrom heat and sunshine, they are quite devoid of the luxuriance and stateliness that characterize them in the tropics. In Europe, for instance, there is but a single palm that is indigenous—theChamærops humilis. The date palm was introduced from the East. In the tropics, however, about eleven hundred species of palms are known, and there is reason to believe that, when this part of the world shall have been thoroughly explored, many new species shall be discovered.The habits as well as the habitats of palms were a source of unfailing interest to us. Some are solitary and are rarely found forming groups with other trees of their species. Others, like the date palm, are quite gregarious and often form extensive clumps. Others still are said to be “social,” because they occupy extensive tracts almost to the entire exclusion of other kinds of trees. Various species ofMauritia,Attalea,CocoaandCoperniciaare social palms, and thepalmares—palm groves—formed by them constitute the most attractive features of tropical landscapes.We once saw near the river’s bank a grove of this kind composed of palms of unusual height and beauty. It had been selected as the last resting place of the denizens of a neighboring village, and was, to our mind, the most beautiful cemetery in the world. Could we have our choice, we should prefer, by far, to repose under one of those noble frond-bearing shafts to being shelved away in the costliest marble vault of Père Lachaise.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.Certain palms affect the open savanna, others seek the solitudes of the forest, while still others are most frequently found midway between these two—that is, on the belt of land that separates forest from plain. Some palms, like the cocoa, seem to require an atmosphere that is slightly saline, and thrive best near the ocean’s shore. Others apparently attain their greatest development in marshes and lowlands, while others again demand the arid plain or the lofty mountain plateau.In spite of their noble appearance and their aspect of perennial youth, palms, as a rule, are short-lived. None of them ever attain the age of the venerable patriarchs of our northern forests. According to Martius, the span of a palm’s life never exceeds that of a few generations of men. The areca catechu runs its course in forty or fifty years, the cocoa attains an age of one hundred or one hundred and twenty years at most, while the date palm, which probably lives the longest, usually rounds out its existence within the period of two centuries.Some palms, like theMetroxylon, for instance, never survive fructification. It fruits but once, and then, as Martius so graphically expresses it, “nobilis arbor mox riget, perit et cadit”—the noble tree presently withers, perishes and falls. But, continues the same writer, “there is pleasure and solace in the thought that palms never die without yielding fruit, thereby insuring the continuance of the species.” And then, as is his wont when opportunity offers, he takes occasion from this circumstance to moralize as follows: “To labor, to flourish, to fructify is granted not only to the palm but to man also.”23In the foregoing pages I have mentioned some of the countless uses made of palms, especially by the inhabitants of the tropics. It would, however, require a large volume to enumerate all the purposes for which they are employed. It can, however, safely be asserted that no family in the great vegetable kingdom more completely meets the necessities of millions of people than does that of the noble and ever-beautiful Palmaceæ.Like Martius, we always found in the contemplation of the palm a source of special joy and peace. To him the palm was what literature was to Cicero, a consolation in trial and affliction, and the delight and inspiration of maturer years. In the palm we always found something to elevate the mind, something that fascinated us and stirred our emotions in a manner that often surprised us. For us,as for myriads of others who have lived and struggled and attained the goal of the heart’s desire, the palm was the emblem of victory, of a higher and better life beyond the tomb, of a happy, glorious immortality.As we gazed in silent delight at the broad expanse of the green-carpeted savanna, adorned with the graceful, columnar shafts and feathery fronds of the ever-beautiful, ever-majestic palm, we could easily fancy ourselves in the valley of the Euphrates or in the plains of Babylon, as described by Herodotus and Xenophon. And, without any effort of the imagination, we could descry, in a palm-shaded village in the vista before us, Jericho, as Moses saw it, when the Land of Promise was a land of palms, as well as a land of milk and honey, and when Judea was so prolific in palms that one of its representatives was chosen as the symbol of the country.24We dreamed of Zenobia’s fair capital, Palmyra—the city of Palms—of the land of the Nile, where Isis and Osiris carried palms as the symbol of their fecund power. We recalled the enthusiastic words of the ancient poets—Hebrew and Greek—in praise of the gracefulness and magnificence of the palm, and the plaintive elegy of Abdul Rhaman, first calif of Cordoba, who, exiled from Damascus, his home, thus addresses the date palm, that reminds him of the land of his birth: “Thou, also, beautiful palm, art here a stranger. The sweet zephyr of Algaraba descends and caresses thy beauty. Thou growest in this fertile soil and raisest thy crown to the skies. What bitter tears thou would’st shed, if, like me, thou hadst feeling!”25While thus musing on the glories of the past and contemplating the splendors of the present, which were passing in rapid succession before our enchanted vision, we instinctively repeated the words of the reverent poet-naturalist,Martius, who, contemplating the marvels of the tropical palm-world, expressed the depth of his emotion by the two words,Sursum corda—hearts heavenward!Just then our reveries were suddenly and unexpectedly interrupted.We had, early in the day, been congratulating ourselves on making our voyage down the river without delay and without accident. We were now within sight of Barranquilla and expected to land in less than an hour. We were in the full enjoyment of one of those delightful day-dreams that we always loved to indulge in, whenever Flora displayed before us, as she did then, her choicest treasures, when suddenly, without premonition of any kind, there was a violent lurch of the boat, a creaking and a crushing noise abaft, a quick stoppage of the engine, all of which indicated that something unusual, if not serious, had befallen our ill-fated craft. A hasty examination showed that the steamer had collided with a sunken tree, and that several of the float-boards of the stern-wheel had been loosened, or partially wrenched from their places. After considerable delay the boatmen were able so to repair the damage that we were able to continue on our journey, although at a reduced speed.Very shortly afterwards there was a second and a much severer crash. We had encountered another hidden tree. This time several of the float-boards were carried away from the wheel entirely, and the wheel itself was so racked that repair, while on the river, was quite impossible. Fortunately, as we were going down stream, we were able to float to the entrance of the canal that leads to the docks of Barranquilla. Here a crowd of stevedores from the town soon congregated. These men, mostly negroes, agreed, after some parleying, to haul the boat to the landing place. They, accordingly, took hold of a long rope, which was thrown ashore, and soon the disabled steamer was being conveyed to her moorings in the same fashion as a canal boat is drawn along by mules in tandem. Wereached the wharf the fifth day26after leaving Honda, just as the sun was setting, and when the customs officers were about to close their office for the night. They, however, kindly allowed us to disembark and we were soon on our way to a hotel.“How fortunate,” C. exclaimed, “that this accident did not occur midway up the river!” Such a mishap would have entailed much suffering and might have delayed our arrival at Barranquilla, for days, if not for weeks. And considering our happy escape from the detentions and disasters from which so many others had suffered, and the peculiar episode that characterized our last hours on the Magdalena, we were forcibly reminded of the words of Dante:—“Let not the people be too swift to judge.For I have seenA bark, that all her way across the seaRan straight and speedy, perish at the lastE’en in the haven’s mouth.”27

While in Guaduas we met a Scotch engineer, who was superintendent of a gold mine in the mountains west of Honda. Desiring to know the truth about the excessive temperature of this place, about which we had heard so many reports, we asked him if it was really true that the heat in Honda was as intense as represented.

“You will,” he said, “find it the hottest place you have ever visited. It is certainly the most torrid place I know, and I have been something of a globe-trotter in my time. Hades, if I have caught the meaning of the word, as used in the Revised Version, is quite temperate in comparison with it. Business frequently calls me to Bogotá, and, on my way thither, I must necessarily pass through Honda, but I never stop there longer than is absolutely necessary, and I always try to avoid being there in the daytime. If I must stop there for a few hours, I time my journey so as to arrive there at night, and make it a point to leave before morning. Hot? I think it is the hottest and most suffocatingspot on earth. It has always been a mystery to me how people can live there at all. I know of nothing to compare it with except one of the burning pits of Dante’s Inferno.”

Had we not learned by long experience how to discount such statements, the prospect of spending some days in a town with such a reputation for grilling the stranger within its gates, would have been anything but inviting. But we had heard similar reports about the llanos and the valley of the Orinoco, and had found, on arriving in these regions, that the temperature said to prevail there had been greatly exaggerated. The same we found to be true of Honda. During our sojourn there, our thermometer never registered more than 86° F. in the shade. Of course, around midday it was uncomfortable in the sun, but I have been in many places in the United States where I suffered more from the heat than I did in Honda.

The town is about seven hundred feet above sea level and counts nearly four thousand inhabitants. It is separated into two parts by the river Guali, which here enters the Magdalena. Being the centre of traffic for Bogotá, the upper Magdalena, and the mining district round about Mariquita, it is a place of considerable importance. As soon, however, as the Colombian National Railway, now nearing completion, shall have connected Girardot with Bogotá, Honda will lose the commercial supremacy it has maintained for nearly three centuries. There will then be little reason for a town in this place, and it will lapse into a straggling village similar to many others along the river.

And the Muisca Trail, over which we had so delightful a ride, will be no longer needed, and will soon disappear in the dense and rank vegetation through which it passes. Then, too, will disappear those long and picturesque mule-trains, that so often crowded us to the roadside on our way from Bogotá, and which have been almost the sole means employed for the transportation of freight and passengers since the capital was founded by Quesada nearly four centuriesago. We shall always congratulate ourselves that we were able to make the trip on mule-back rather than by a railway train. We can thus feel that we have, to a great extent, seen the country as it was in colonial times—before its character was modified by the innovations of modern progress and the introduction of modern inventions.

In 1805 Honda was visited by a terrific earthquake, from the effects of which it has never recovered. Everywhere are evidences of the frightful cataclysm. Some of the largest and most important structures are still in ruins. Nor has any attempt ever been made to restore certain quarters of the town to their prior condition.

After a few days’ halt at Honda, we were ready to continue our journey towards the Caribbean. The rapids of the Magdalena make it impracticable for steamers to ascend the river as far as the town. For this reason, it is necessary to go by rail to La Dorada, eighteen miles northwards. But, although the distance is so short, it takes two hours for the train to make the run. The road, however, passes through a picturesque country and time passes pleasantly and quickly. Before one realizes it, one is at La Dorada, where the transfer is made to the steamer bound for Barranquilla.

There are several lines of steamboats plying between La Dorada and Barranquilla and intermediate points. But all the boats, which are stern-wheelers, are quite small. The largest of them will not carry more than four hundred tons. Usually the tonnage is much less—not more than one or two hundred tons.2Our boat, which was recommended as the best and the most comfortable on the river, was one of the largest and newest, but, if it was the best, it is difficult to conceive what the others must have been.

A glance was sufficient to convince us that the craft on the Magdalena are in every way inferior to those on the Orinoco and its affluents. The Venezuelan boats are larger, and with incomparably better equipment and appointments. They are clean, well kept, and the service is good. Their cabins are commodious and well ventilated. They are, besides, provided with all necessary furniture and the berths are as comfortable as could be desired.

But how different is it on the Magdalena boats! In the cabins, in place of berths with neat bedding, there is a bare cot, usually of questionable cleanliness. Each passenger is supposed to supply his own bedding. As to lavatories and bathrooms, those that we saw were filthy beyond description. Our stewards were half-dressed, barefooted, slovenly, unwashed negro boys, who seemed to have been picked up on the streets at random, just before the boat left its moorings. The cuisine and service were in keeping with everything else, and left very much room for improvement. The natives, having nothing better, seemed to be satisfied with the conditions that obtained. The foreigners, however, and there were representatives of several nationalities aboard, could never become reconciled to the lack of so many things essential to comfortable traveling, and were always glad when their river experiences were at an end.

For ourselves, who had been roughing it so long, the trip down the river was not so trying as it was for many others. We were, besides, better prepared for such a journey than the other passengers. We had our camping outfits with us, together with clean bedding, which had received the attention of the laundress before we left Bogotá. We had, besides, good cumare hammocks, and mosquito nets, so that we had nothing to apprehend from filth, vermin or insects. Thus equipped, we really enjoyed our voyage on the Magdalena, but we were probably the only ones who did.

After we had gotten fairly started down stream, andcould contemplate at our leisure the rich tropical vegetation that fringed both banks, our minds reverted to the first trip made down this river by Europeans. The travelers were the celebrated conquistadores, of whom mention has already been made, viz., Quesada, Belalcazar and Federmann. They embarked with a number of soldiers at Guataqui, a short distance above Honda. But they had scarcely started on their downward course, before they encountered the rapids at the mouth of the Guali. They were then obliged to unload their two brigantines and canoes and transport their contents to the lower part of the cataract, whence, after reloading, they were able to proceed again on their long journey to Cartagena.

It was while passing this point that Quesada learned from his Indian boatmen of the existence of gold in the valley of the Guali. In consequence of this information, the town of Marquita was founded without delay, and has ever since been a mining centre of considerable importance. It was in this place that Quesada died after his return from Spain. From here his remains were transferred to the Cathedral of Bogotá, where they still repose.

According to Padre Simon, Quesada and his companions were frequently, during their journey down the river, attacked by Indians, “who came out to salute them and speed their way with a shower of poisoned arrows.” “With the help of God,” he continues, “joined to eternal vigilance, their own valor and a liberal supply of powder and firearms with which the soldiers of Belalcazar were provided, they were able finally to arrive at Cartagena, and give the first information regarding the great campaign in which Quesada and his followers had achieved such signal success.”3

The Magdalena, like many other water courses in South America, was at first known as the Rio Grande—the great river. It was subsequently given the name it now bearsin honor of St. Mary Magdalene.4At times it is comparatively narrow and deep. Then navigation is easy and without danger. At other times,

“Shallow, disreputable, vastIt spreads across the western plains.”

“Shallow, disreputable, vast

It spreads across the western plains.”

Then progress is difficult, and the boat may run into a sand bar at any moment. And if the river should then be falling, it may be impossible to get the craft free until the water rises. Only a short time before our trip one of the steamers had been held in a sand bank for forty days. As it was not near any place where provisions could be obtained, the passengers suffered greatly from hunger, not to speak of the suspense and enforced detention on an uncomfortable boat.

Owing to the shallowness of the river, the boat was, during the first part of the voyage, always tied up for the night at the first tree or stump that might be found on the bank at sunset. The following morning we were supposed to resume our journey at daybreak, but, as the firemen did not begin to get up steam before that time, it was usually an hour after sunrise before we were under way. We stopped at every village and warehouse along the river, sometimes to deliver the mail, often consisting of only a single letter or package, or to take on a passenger. Two or three times a day, also, we halted to take on wood to supply the furnace with fuel, for here, as on the Meta, coal is not used. Fortunately, we were never obliged, as on the Meta, to delay until the wood could be cut. Large wood piles are found every few miles all along the river. They usually belong to a negro, who has a hut or shed near by, together with a small garden and a few domestic animals which supply him and his family with food in their sequestered home.

We stopped at several large warehouses, many of themconstructed of corrugated iron from the United States. This seems strange in a land where timber is so abundant. But there are no sawmills in the Magdalena valley. South of Barranquilla—where but little lumber is produced—imported lumber would be more expensive and less durable than iron. At these places the chief articles of merchandise are coffee, cacao, hides and vegetable ivory. This last product, also called ivory nuts, is the fruit of a species of palm known asPhytelephas macrocarpa,5and constitutes, in this part of Colombia, an important article of commerce. For many things it is a good substitute for elephant ivory, which it rivals in whiteness, beauty and solidity, and collecting it for shipment gives occupation to quite a number of the poor inhabitants of the Magdalena valley.

We usually went ashore at the different landing places to see the people and familiarize ourselves with their mode of life. It was generally as simple and primitive as possible—almost as primitive, in some instances, as we conceive it to have been in the Quaternary period or in the days of the Troglodytes. Often their dwellings were little more than palm-thatched sheds—barely sufficient to shield their occupants from sun and rain. Atulpa, consisting of three stones, served them in lieu of a stove, and on this they broiled the fish caught in the river, or prepared theirarepas—corn cakes—or theirsancocho, a kind of ragout, as popular in some parts of Colombia as it is in Venezuela.

We were surprised to see in the houses and shops along the Magdalena valley—what we had often observed in various parts of Colombia and Venezuela—the large number of illustrated circulars of Spanish, English and French proprietary medicines. The insides of certain houses were sometimes quite plastered over with them. But what was more surprising was the number of lithographs we saw ofthe German Emperor. Sometimes he was represented alone, at others he was depicted as surrounded by the members of his family. In several places we saw pictures not only of the emperor and his family, but also those of his father and grandfather and Bismarck. And the remarkable thing about it was that, in some cases, there were no Germans living within hundreds of miles of where we came across these pictures. Had some enthusiastic Teuton tried to start a propaganda in favor of the Vaterland by distributing broadcast these engravings of the imperial family? I know not, but, judging solely from the number of their pictures we came across in Venezuela and Colombia, one would be led to suppose that the Hohenzollern rulers are the most popular of potentates, at least in this part of South America.

While stopping to take on some rubber at a certain small village, we had a remarkable illustration of the rapidity with which the bed of the river is sometimes changed, even when the water is comparatively low. We had scarcely reached the landing place when there was a terrific crash, occasioned by the falling in of a large section of the bank on which the village was built. Soon afterwards another section gave way, and then a third and a fourth. The whole bank seemed to be undermined by the river, and, although the warehouse was fully fifty feet away from the water when we arrived, so much of the bank had been carried away in less than half an hour, that not only the contents of the building, but also the building itself had to be hurriedly removed in order that it and the merchandise stored within might not be borne away by the resistless current. As the structure was of light bamboo, and put together with a view to such an emergency, the transfer was not a difficult task. When we started to continue our course, it looked as if the eroding action of the river would necessitate the changing of the site of the entire village before nightfall.

Such changes in the course of the river are not uncommon.They are going on all the time in some part or other of the valley. One may frequently see immense masses of earth suddenly detached, which are a serious menace to the champans6—large covered flat-boats—and other small craft that happen to pass by at the time. Sometimes the giants of the forest are thus wrested from their footholds, and may be seen drifting down stream together with masses of vegetation attached to them. At times, too, masses of earth, like floating islets, are visible, and may travel a long distance down stream before their course is arrested by an island or a sand bar.

Ordinarily the changes in the river bed are gradual and occasion little danger to life or property. Sometimes, however, during the rainy season, and when the flood is unusually high, widespread devastation is the result. Whole villages are swept away by the deluge; and towns, that were before important commercial centres, are suddenly isolated and left far from the navigable part of the river. Places that before were favorably situated are, after the flood, found to be in the midst of pestiferous morasses. Such has been the fate of many places along the waterways of Colombia, but more notably in the great island of Mompos, near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena. Here several places that were at onetime centres of industrial and agricultural activity, have long since either ceased to exist or lost entirely their pristine importance.

Champan Going Up the Magdalena.Champan Going Up the Magdalena.

Champan Going Up the Magdalena.

The town of Mompos is probably the most remarkable example of this kind. Founded in 1539 by Alonso de Heredia, it is one of the oldest towns in the republic, and was for generations the most important commercial centre between Cartagena and Honda. But owing to a displacement of the main channel of the river, and the filling in of the branch of the river on which the town was built, it is now practically deprived of its former means of communication with the rest of the country, and is rapidly verging towards extinction.

The Magdalena, as a commercial highway, has been much neglected. As a consequence, no one can calculate when leaving Honda, how long it will take him to reach Barranquilla. It may require five or six days, or it may demand twice that much time. All depends on the shifting bed of the river, or the blocking of the channel by sand bars and accumulations of floating timber. By reason of these obstructions and the ever-varying depth of the main channel, navigation is usually impossible at night, except below the island of Mompos, where the volume of water is swelled by the tribute of the mighty Cauca.

If the Magdalena were under the supervision of a corps of competent engineers, having at their disposal the necessary dredges and other appliances for keeping the main channel in prime condition, a properly constructed boat would easily make the trip from Honda to the mouth of the river in two days, and traverse the same course up stream in three days at most. It is really a pity to see such a splendid water course so neglected. If cared for as it should be, it could easily be rendered an artery for inland commerce of the first importance. As it is, transportation, as now carried on, is always slow and uncertain, and never free from danger and disaster.

As a serviceable means of communication with the outside world we were constantly contrasting the Magdalena with the Meta. From our observations, we should consider the Meta, from its junction with the Orinoco to Cabuyaro or even to the mouth of the Humea, as a safer waterway than the Magdalena. Only twice did our boat graze a sand bank in the Meta, but it continued its course without a moment’s stoppage. In the Magdalena, however, we frequently ran into sand bars, or shallow water, and, on several occasions, had difficulty in extricating and floating our craft. Once we were delayed for some time, and began to fear that, owing to the falling water, we should be stranded for weeks, as other boats had been not long before.

When peace shall have been firmly established in Colombia, and its finances shall have been placed on a satisfactory basis, the patriotic and far-seeing statesmen of the republic, will, I am convinced, see the necessity of carrying out the plan of the former Archbishop and Viceroy of New Granada—Don Antonio Caballero y Gongora—and connecting Bogotá with Europe by means of the Meta and the Orinoco. It will not be a difficult feat of engineering to build a railroad from the capital to a suitable point on the Meta, and the length of such a road need not exceed one hundred and fifty miles at most. This will bring Bogatá within eight or ten hours of the head waters of navigation, and develop the most valuable and most productive grazing section of the country.

The highest point the road need reach in crossing the Eastern Cordilleras will be less than that of several passes in Colorado, where the Rocky Mountains are scaled by the iron-horse with a long train of cargo behind him. The pass of Chipaque, by which we entered thealtiplaniciesof Bogotá, is several thousand feet lower than the heights crossed by the railways leading from the waters of the Pacific to Lake Titicaca, and to Argentina by way of Cumbre Pass, and is nearly a mile lower than the pointwhere the Galera tunnel pierces the Cordillera on the way from Lima to Oroya.7

What Colombia really needs is the betterment of both its great waterways—the Meta for the eastern and the Magdalena for the western part of the republic. Until they shall both have been put in such condition as to be navigable during the entire year, it will be impossible fully to develop the marvelous resources of this extensive country. River traffic will always remain cheaper than traffic by rail, and, on account of many physical difficulties, it is highly improbable that certain valuable sections of territory will ever be tapped by railroads. When, however, these two main arteries of commerce shall have received the attention they deserve and shall have been put in communication with the rich grazing, mining and agricultural regions by the various lines of railway that are contemplated or in course of construction, Colombia will at once take a position among the richest and most flourishing republics of South America. Only those who have traveled through it can fully realize its wonderful natural riches, or form an adequate conception of its vast extent. Sufficient to state that its area is more than ten times as great as the state of New York, or as great as that of France, Germany and the British Isles combined.

As to the great Pan-American line which has been projected to connect New York with Buenos Ayres, that is talked of in Colombia as well as in the United States. But when one contemplates the enormous engineering difficulties to be encountered in the construction of the section extending from Costa Rica to the frontier of Ecuador, one is compelled to regard the project as a much more arduous undertaking than some of its enthusiastic promoters would have us believe. Railway communication will soon be completefrom Buenos Ayres to Central Peru, and, judging by work now being accomplished in Ecuador, steel rails will soon span the country from the northern to the southern boundaries of this republic. But with all this work completed, the most difficult part of the colossal enterprise will still remain untouched. Even should the road eventually be completed, as is possible, it is still doubtful whether long stretches of it would ever pay even a nominal interest on the investment.

The part of the Magdalena valley between Honda and the island of Mompos is but sparsely inhabited. Most of the inhabitants are Indians, mestizos, or negroes, the descendants of former slaves.8On account of the heat and malaria that always prevail in the lowlands, but few white men are found here, and their sojourn, as a rule, is only temporary. But near the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena, and thence to the Caribbean, there are rich and extensiveesteros—grazing lands—covered with succulent Para and Guinea grasses, several feet high. In these broad plains, there are no fewer than half a million cattle, not to speak of large numbers of horses, mules and other domestic animals. Some of the cattle we saw reminded us of the fat, sleek animals we had seen on the llanos watered by the Rio Negro and the Humea. Under more favorable conditions the number could greatly be increased.

The scenery along the Magdalena is much like that along the Meta and the Orinoco, except that along the western river one sees more of the mountains, especially in the southern part. The vegetation is similar in character and quite as varied and exuberant. On both sides of the river trees and bushes are so massed together as toform an impenetrable wall. Everywhere there is a veritable maze of creeping plants, of bromelias, bignonias, passifloras. And everywhere, too, are lianas—aptly named monkey-ladders—which bind tree to tree and branch to branch. Usually they are single, like ropes—whence their name bush ropes—but often they are twined together like strands in a cable. Frequently they are seen descending from the topmost part of a tree to the ground, where they forthwith strike root and present the appearance of the stays and shrouds of a ship’s main mast. And where there is air and sunshine, these lianas, which often form bights like ropes, are loaded with epiphytes of all kinds, and decorated with the rarest and most beautiful orchids. Indeed, the regions on both sides of the Magdalena have long been favorite resorts for the orchid hunters in the employ of the florists and merchant princes of the United States and Europe. From here these bizarre vegetable forms are shipped by thousands. One enthusiastic English collector tells us how he secured, as the result of two months’ work about ten thousand plants of the highly prizedOdontoglossum. But to obtain these orchids he was obliged to fell some four thousand trees.

“The most magnificent sight,” he writes, “for even the most stoical observer, is the immense clumps ofCattleya Mendelii, each new bulb bearing four or five of its gorgeous rose-colored flowers, many of them growing in the full sun, or with very little shade, and possessing a glowing color which is very difficult to get in the stuffy hothouses where the plants are cultivated. Some of these plants, considering their size and the slowness of growth, must have taken many years to develop, for I have taken plants from the trees with five hundred bulbs, and as many as one hundred spikes of flowers, which, to a lover of orchids, is a sight worth traveling from Europe to see.”9

It is when contemplating the marvelous variety andluxuriance of intertropical flora—of which one in our northern climes can have no adequate conception—that one is tempted to exclaim with Wordsworth:—

“It is my faith, that every flowerEnjoys the air it breathes.”10

“It is my faith, that every flower

Enjoys the air it breathes.”10

And if the extraordinary claims which Professors Wagner, France and G. H. Darwin make for plants be true, viz., that they have minds and are conscious of their existence, that they feel pain and have memories, then, indeed, should we be disposed to regard the exuberant and wondrously developed plants of the equatorial world as occupying the highest plane in the evolutionary process of vegetable life.

Passing the embouchure of the Opon, on the right bank of the Magdalena, evoked, in a special manner, memories of Quesada and his valiant band. It was here they left the Magdalena during that memorable expedition that made them the undisputed masters of the country now known as Colombia. More than eight months had passed since they had started from Santa Marta on their career of discovery and conquest. The difficulties they had to encounter and the sufferings they had to endure were extreme. Mosquitoes, wasps, ants and other insects; reptiles and jaguars gave them no rest, day or night. Certain kinds of worms, the old chroniclers tell us, buried themselves in the flesh of the exhausted and half-famished men and caused them untold agony. Indians everywhere laid ambush for them, and assailed them with poisoned arrows from every point of vantage. Even the elements seemed to conspire against them. There was a continual downpour of rain, so that it was impossible to light a fire for any purpose. Their arms were almost destroyed by rust, and they were left withouta single dry charge of powder. Their provisions became exhausted and starvation stared them in the face. To preserve life they devoured their sword scabbards and every article of leather they had with them. There was incessant thunder, unchanging gloom, eternal horror, and other features of the pit infernal. Their course was through dense underbrush and pestiferous swamps and up precipitous acclivities, whither they had to drag their weakened horses by long lianas that served the purpose of ropes.11

Finally, after the most heroic efforts, they came to a place where they found provisions—a veritable land of promise for the suffering but intrepid Spaniards. They had left behind them the inhospitable sierras of the Opon, and were on the verge of the fertile plateau of Cundinamarca, that constituted the home of the Muiscas. Here they found maize, potatoes,12yucas, beans, tomatoes and, as Padre Simon phrases it, “a thousand otherchucherias—titbits—of the aborigines.” Well could they, in the language of Castellanos, exclaim, with thanksgiving:

“A good land! A good land! A land which puts an end to our suffering, a land of gold, a land of plenty. A land for a home, a land of benediction, bright and serene.”

It was then that the enthusiastic soldiers, whose courage would often have faltered, had it not been for the determination and perseverance of their invincible leader, gathered around Quesada to congratulate him on the successful issueof his great undertaking, and to assure him of their undying loyalty in any future enterprise in which he might require their services.

And well they might render the noble licentiate the meed of praise he so well deserved, for had it not been for him, the expedition would have been a failure, and they would undoubtedly have perished before they could have returned to Santa Marta, as had so many of their companions, who had turned back before the ascent of the Cordillera was begun. To some of his officers who, in view of the unheard-of difficulties they had to encounter, recommended that the expedition be abandoned, he replied that he would regard as a personal enemy any one who, in future, would make such a pusillanimous proposal and one so foreign to Spanish valor.

All in all, he was one of the bravest and most humane of the conquistadores, and successfully performed a task before which a less valorous commander would have given up in despair. His achievements obscure by their brilliancy and daring those of Amadis and Roldan and are in no wise inferior to those of any of the conquistadores. They may truthfully, in the words of Bacon, written anent a performance of Sir Richard Grenville, be styled as “memorable beyond credit, and to the height of some heroical fable.”

Quesada has taken his place in Valhalla among the greatest of the world’s heroes, and his memory will endure as long as splendid deeds of prowess shall stir the souls of men. Of him and his gallant companions one can say what Peter Martyr wrote of their countrymen in general:—

“Wherefore, the Spanyardes in these owre dayes and theyr noble enterpryses, doo not gyue place eyther to the factes of Saturnus, or Hercules, or any other of the ancient princes of famous memorie, which werecanonizedamonge the goddes cauled Heroes for theyr searchinge of newe landes, and regions, and bringinge the same to better culture and ciuilitie.”13

Lower down the Magdalena, on the left bank of the river, we approached the scene of the exploits of another of the distinguished conquistadores—Pedro de Heredia, the founder of Cartagena. After he had reduced to submission the Indians who had been victorious over Ojeda, he started towards the Magdalena, where he collected such immense treasures of gold that when it was divided, each soldier received no less than 6,000 ducats. This was the equivalent of $48,000 in gold at the present valuation of this metal, and was the largest apportionment of spoil, at least, so far as private soldiers were concerned, made during the conquest.14He afterwards made a similar expedition to the territories drained by the San Jorge and the Nechi, affluents of the Cauca, in search of the rich veins whence the Indians extracted their gold. He did not find the objects of his quest, but came across several rich cemeteries, in which the dead had been interred with their jewels, and a sanctuary with idols adorned with plates of gold. From these he secured treasures to the amount of more than $3,000,000 of our money.15

Strange as it may seem, the method Heredia resorted to of securing gold, the rifling of thehuacas—burial places—of the aborigines, has been continued until the present day. There are still men in Colombia, notably in Antioquia—huaqueros, they are called—who gain a livelihood by searching for huacas and extracting from them the gold and emeralds they frequently contain.

The year before our trip there appeared in an English magazine, the following paragraph in an article purporting to give a picture of the Magdalena valley and its life:—

“Anchored in the forest at midnight, the traveler hearsthe deep growl of the jaguar, the sharp squeal of the wild cat, the howl of the howler monkey, the long moan of the sloth, and the last scream of the wild pig, pierced by the claws of some patient but ferocious animal ambushed during the past hour, with many other sounds of life, terror and conflict that fall strangely on the European ear, and, if he waits and watches until the dawn, he may see the alligator dragging his ugly bulk out of the water, crowds of turtles trailing on the sands, the deer and the tapir coming down to drink, thousands of white cranes on the branches nearest to their prey, thousands of gray ones already wading leg-deep, and many more thousands of other birds clouding the dim horizon, all waiting for the light ere they begin their work of life and slaughter.... With the alligators in shoals at the bottom of the river, and the millions of birds above its surface, one wonders how any fish are left, yet the river is always literally teeming with fish, as though conscious of the demands it has to meet.”

Although we were always on the alert, so as to miss nothing of interest, especially anything that concerned the animal life of the tropics, we must confess that in all our experience we never heard growls, squeals, howls, moans, screams, or other sounds of terror and conflict, either along the Magdalena or anywhere else in South America. And we spent nearly a year in the country, and often traveled weeks at a time in the wild virgin forest, far away from human habitations of every kind. Nor did we ever perceive any of the animals that certain tourists would lead one to believe can be seen in such numbers everywhere, even from the deck of a passing steamer. Nowhere along the Orinoco, the Meta, the Magdalena, or elsewhere, did we ever catch even a glimpse of a jaguar or a puma, a manati or a sloth, a wild cat or a wild pig. More than this, not once, during our entire trip through Venezuela and Colombia, through forests and plains, did we ever see a single monkey, except two or three that were kept as petsby the natives. This may seem an incredible statement. I would have believed such an experience as ours to be absolutely impossible, especially in view of what writers and travelers in South America have told us regarding the immense number of wild animals of all kinds everywhere visible in equatorial wilds. But I am stating a fact that I am quite unable to reconcile with the contrary experiences of others who, according to their own admission, have seen but little, compared with what we saw, of the lands through which we passed. I have seen more large game on the plains of New Mexico and Wyoming, from the window of a Pullman car, in a single trip to and from the Pacific coast, than I ever saw in the wilds of South America during nearly a twelvemonth.

Nor did we ever see along the Magdalena, or anywhere else, the “thousands of white cranes on branches,” nor the “thousands of gray ones wading leg-deep,” nor the “many more thousands clouding the dim horizon,” of which the writer of the above-mentioned article professes to have been the fortunate spectator. We rarely saw more than a few dozen cranes at a time—never a hundred, and I have reason to believe we enjoyed very favorable opportunities, at least during a portion of our long journey, for seeing what was to be seen. At no time did we ever observe as many birds in the air at one time as I have frequently seen in the United States. I feel safe in asserting positively that the number of wild pigeons I have frequently noted in a single flock in the United States, would more than equal that of all the birds combined that we saw while in the tropics.

Mr. F. Lorraine Petre evidently had an experience somewhat similar to ours. In his recent work on Colombia, he tells us frankly that one sees little of animal life on the Magdalena, that “of the mammalia one sees and hears little.... Of the jaguars, the pumas, the sloths, the peccaries, the deer, the tapirs, and other animals, dangerous or harmless, we saw or heard as little as we did of the bears which inhabit the hills beyond. It is surprisingthat, tied up, as we often were, right against the forest, we should not have heard the night call of the carnivora, or the sharp bark of the frightened deer, but truth compels us to admit that we did not, and, moreover, that the cry of even the howling monkey did not salute us.”16

The number of birds observed along the Magdalena was not greater than I have frequently seen in the valleys of the Missouri or the Columbia. Most of these were parrots and macaws. Always noisy and restless, always flying and climbing about, except when eating fruit or cracking nuts, one is at times tempted to describe them as feathered relatives of the monkey. The parrots are sometimes seen in flocks, and their piercing cries are at times almost deafening. They are a sociable bird and are usually seen in considerable numbers. The macaws are remarkable for always flying in pairs, and for their brilliant colors. Their body is flaming scarlet, their wings are tinged with various shades of red, yellow, green and blue, while their tail is bright blue and scarlet. They, too, like parrots, are very vociferous, and, although they may occasionally be found in large numbers, they always fly two and two.

The large animals most frequently seen along the Magdalena, as along other tropical rivers, are those horrid monsters, “ambiguous between sea and land,” the cayman and “the scaly crocodile.” But even they are not so numerous as certain travelers would have us believe. The largest number we ever saw at one time was fifteen. They were sunning themselves on aplaya—sand bank—below the island of Mompos. On the Orinoco and the Meta we never beheld more than eight at any one time—unless wewere to count a number of little ones, just hatched, which Luisito, our colored boy, caught one day while we were taking on wood on the lower Meta.17

The early Spaniards called all these saurians by the general name oflagartos—lizards. The English afterwards spoke of a single animal as a lagarto, whence the present name alligator. Modern writers speak of them indiscriminately as alligators or crocodiles. As a matter of fact, several species of both alligators and crocodiles are found in the equatorial regions. But, notwithstanding all that has hitherto been written about them, their distinction and definition, their classification still remains a matter of difficulty. Some specimens have been found whose classification is so perplexing that naturalists are still undecided whether to regard them as crocodiles or alligators. In this respect they are much like Shakespeare’s two lovers, “Two distincts, division none.”

The name cayman is employed in Venezuela and Colombia to designate any of these saurians. Following the classification adopted in the British Museum the cayman is distinct from both alligator and crocodile. More than this. According to the British system of classification, there are no alligators at all in South America, while, in the waters of Colombia and Venezuela, there are two species of crocodile and three species of cayman.

Probably more fabulous accounts have obtained about crocodiles than about any other animal. In spite of the old saying to the contrary, they never shed tears. And notwithstanding the fact that the ancient Egyptians gave the crocodile divine honors, because, being tongueless, it wasmade in hieroglyphical writing, a symbol of the Divinity, it is now known that the tongue of this erstwhile god is quite large, except at the tip. Similarly, all the stories that have so long been current about the impenetrability of the animal’s hide, are quite without foundation. How often have we not been told that it is impossible to kill a crocodile, with even the best Winchester, unless the ball enter the eye or strike under the soft, fleshy parts of the front legs? Their plated skin is easily pierced by an ordinary rifle or revolver, and a mortal wound ensues whenever a vital part is penetrated.

Not less erroneous are the ideas that so widely prevail regarding the ferocity of the crocodile and the cayman. On the contrary, they are, in their native state, very timid animals, and rarely exhibit hostility towards man, except when cornered. Then, like most other animals, they will fight with great fierceness. They make for the water as soon as they see one approach them, and it is often far from easy to get near them. We often saw the natives enter rivers frequented by crocodiles and caymans, something they surely would not have done if the danger were as great as ordinarily imagined. In Venezuela the Indian or mestizo has a much greater dread of the ray or carib fish than of the cayman.18

Some attempts have been made, both on the Orinoco and the Magdalena, to secure the hides of crocodiles and caymans for commercial purposes, but the expense of preparing them for the market proved to be so great that the work had to be abandoned.19

The early explorers of the New World had many stories to tell about the cayman and the crocodile, and many of them have apparently survived among the natives until the present day. But there were many other animals that made even a greater impression on them. It will suffice to reproduce Peter Martyr’s quaint account of two of these representatives of the American fauna. The first is the tapir, of which he writes as follows:—

“But there is especially one beast engendered here, in which nature hath endeuoured to shew her cunnyng. This beaste is as bygge as an oxe, armed with a longe snoute lyke an elephant, and yet no elephant. Of the colour of an oxe and yet noo oxe. With the houfe of a horse, and yet noo horse. With eares also much lyke vnto an elephant, but not soo open nor soo much hangying downe: yet much wyder then the eares of any other beaste.”20

The other animal that excited the wonder of Martyr and his contemporaries was the sloth, of which he says:— “Emonge these trees is fownde that monstrous beaste with a snowte lyke a foxe, a tayle lyke a marmasette, eares lyke a batte, handes lyke a man, and feete lyke an ape, bearing her whelpes abowte with her in an owtwarde bellye much lyke vnto a greate bagge or purse. The dead carkas of this beaste, you sawe with me, and turned it ouer and ouer with yowre owne handes, marueylynge at that newe belly and wonderful prouision of nature. They say it is knownen by experience, that shee neuer letteth her whelpes goo owte of that purse, except it be eyther to play, or to sucke, vntyl suche tyme that they bee able to gette theyr lyuing by them selues.”21

The part of the valley below the confluence of the Cauca and the Magdalena was quite different from that above. The country contained more inhabitants, and the denseforests that had hitherto bordered the river gave place to broad savannas, on which grazed thousands of cattle, so buried in the Para and Guinea grasses, that frequently we could discern only their horns. Along the river banks were the estates of well-to-dohaciendados—some of them foreigners—and the villages, that before were extremely rare, became more numerous. The aspect of the country was less wild than that through which we had just passed, and betokened a certain measure of prosperity, at least so far as the grazing interests were concerned.

We could now travel day and night, for the river was so deep that sand bars were no longer to be apprehended. And then we had the most delightful moonlight nights. The air was balmy and laden with an exquisite fragrance,

“Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,”

“Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes,”

a constant invitation to repose anddolce far niente. The surpassing loveliness of the scene, the magic stillness of the vast solitude through which we were so peacefully gliding, the broad expanse of one of the world’s great rivers, the weird silhouettes cast by the passing palms on the moonlit waters—all these things contributed towards rendering our last night on the river a fitting finale to the others—all of which were in the highest degree enjoyable. Seated on the forward deck of our steamer, we could exclaim in the words of the choric song of Tennyson’sLotos-Eaters:—

“How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,With half-shut eyes ever to seemFalling asleep in a half-dream!Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.”

“How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream,

With half-shut eyes ever to seem

Falling asleep in a half-dream!

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel.”

The following morning—our last day on the Magdalena—found us at Calamar. Here some of our fellow-passengers disembarked to take the train to Cartagena, sixty-five miles to the westward. From Calamar to Barranquilla,the chief northern terminus of river navigation, is sixty-six miles. This distance we expected to make in a few hours, but for reasons presently to be given, we were unexpectedly delayed within sight of Barranquilla, the goal that marked the completion of another important stage in our journey.

Our last day on the Magdalena was a bright balmy one in June. We spent the entire time on the forward part of the upper deck, fanned by the delightful breezes that were wafted from the Caribbean. The river here has about the same width as has the Mississippi at New Orleans, but the scenery is far more attractive. It flows through a broad, level, grass-covered savanna, which extends beyond the limits of vision, and which is dotted here and there with small villages and flourishing haciendas. Some of the houses near the river banks have a most cozy appearance. They are almost embowered in a mass of flowers of every hue, and surrounded by lofty palms whose lovely emerald coronals were each a picture of rarest beauty.

“These princes of the vegetable world” always had a peculiar fascination for us, no matter where we saw them. And during our long journey from the delta of the Orinoco they were never absent from view even for a single hour. When one species disappeared it was replaced by another, and thus they followed us from the Atlantic wave to the lofty crest of Suma Paz. The ocean-loving cocoa gave place to the moriche, and this was in turn succeeded by the corneto of the llanos and the wax palm of the Sierras.22

It is quite impossible for the inhabitants of our northern climes to have anything approaching an adequate conception of the grace and beauty and surpassing loveliness of the omnipresent palms of the equatorial world. Awayfrom heat and sunshine, they are quite devoid of the luxuriance and stateliness that characterize them in the tropics. In Europe, for instance, there is but a single palm that is indigenous—theChamærops humilis. The date palm was introduced from the East. In the tropics, however, about eleven hundred species of palms are known, and there is reason to believe that, when this part of the world shall have been thoroughly explored, many new species shall be discovered.

The habits as well as the habitats of palms were a source of unfailing interest to us. Some are solitary and are rarely found forming groups with other trees of their species. Others, like the date palm, are quite gregarious and often form extensive clumps. Others still are said to be “social,” because they occupy extensive tracts almost to the entire exclusion of other kinds of trees. Various species ofMauritia,Attalea,CocoaandCoperniciaare social palms, and thepalmares—palm groves—formed by them constitute the most attractive features of tropical landscapes.

We once saw near the river’s bank a grove of this kind composed of palms of unusual height and beauty. It had been selected as the last resting place of the denizens of a neighboring village, and was, to our mind, the most beautiful cemetery in the world. Could we have our choice, we should prefer, by far, to repose under one of those noble frond-bearing shafts to being shelved away in the costliest marble vault of Père Lachaise.

A Palm Forest in the Tropics.A Palm Forest in the Tropics.

A Palm Forest in the Tropics.

Certain palms affect the open savanna, others seek the solitudes of the forest, while still others are most frequently found midway between these two—that is, on the belt of land that separates forest from plain. Some palms, like the cocoa, seem to require an atmosphere that is slightly saline, and thrive best near the ocean’s shore. Others apparently attain their greatest development in marshes and lowlands, while others again demand the arid plain or the lofty mountain plateau.

In spite of their noble appearance and their aspect of perennial youth, palms, as a rule, are short-lived. None of them ever attain the age of the venerable patriarchs of our northern forests. According to Martius, the span of a palm’s life never exceeds that of a few generations of men. The areca catechu runs its course in forty or fifty years, the cocoa attains an age of one hundred or one hundred and twenty years at most, while the date palm, which probably lives the longest, usually rounds out its existence within the period of two centuries.

Some palms, like theMetroxylon, for instance, never survive fructification. It fruits but once, and then, as Martius so graphically expresses it, “nobilis arbor mox riget, perit et cadit”—the noble tree presently withers, perishes and falls. But, continues the same writer, “there is pleasure and solace in the thought that palms never die without yielding fruit, thereby insuring the continuance of the species.” And then, as is his wont when opportunity offers, he takes occasion from this circumstance to moralize as follows: “To labor, to flourish, to fructify is granted not only to the palm but to man also.”23

In the foregoing pages I have mentioned some of the countless uses made of palms, especially by the inhabitants of the tropics. It would, however, require a large volume to enumerate all the purposes for which they are employed. It can, however, safely be asserted that no family in the great vegetable kingdom more completely meets the necessities of millions of people than does that of the noble and ever-beautiful Palmaceæ.

Like Martius, we always found in the contemplation of the palm a source of special joy and peace. To him the palm was what literature was to Cicero, a consolation in trial and affliction, and the delight and inspiration of maturer years. In the palm we always found something to elevate the mind, something that fascinated us and stirred our emotions in a manner that often surprised us. For us,as for myriads of others who have lived and struggled and attained the goal of the heart’s desire, the palm was the emblem of victory, of a higher and better life beyond the tomb, of a happy, glorious immortality.

As we gazed in silent delight at the broad expanse of the green-carpeted savanna, adorned with the graceful, columnar shafts and feathery fronds of the ever-beautiful, ever-majestic palm, we could easily fancy ourselves in the valley of the Euphrates or in the plains of Babylon, as described by Herodotus and Xenophon. And, without any effort of the imagination, we could descry, in a palm-shaded village in the vista before us, Jericho, as Moses saw it, when the Land of Promise was a land of palms, as well as a land of milk and honey, and when Judea was so prolific in palms that one of its representatives was chosen as the symbol of the country.24We dreamed of Zenobia’s fair capital, Palmyra—the city of Palms—of the land of the Nile, where Isis and Osiris carried palms as the symbol of their fecund power. We recalled the enthusiastic words of the ancient poets—Hebrew and Greek—in praise of the gracefulness and magnificence of the palm, and the plaintive elegy of Abdul Rhaman, first calif of Cordoba, who, exiled from Damascus, his home, thus addresses the date palm, that reminds him of the land of his birth: “Thou, also, beautiful palm, art here a stranger. The sweet zephyr of Algaraba descends and caresses thy beauty. Thou growest in this fertile soil and raisest thy crown to the skies. What bitter tears thou would’st shed, if, like me, thou hadst feeling!”25

While thus musing on the glories of the past and contemplating the splendors of the present, which were passing in rapid succession before our enchanted vision, we instinctively repeated the words of the reverent poet-naturalist,Martius, who, contemplating the marvels of the tropical palm-world, expressed the depth of his emotion by the two words,Sursum corda—hearts heavenward!

Just then our reveries were suddenly and unexpectedly interrupted.

We had, early in the day, been congratulating ourselves on making our voyage down the river without delay and without accident. We were now within sight of Barranquilla and expected to land in less than an hour. We were in the full enjoyment of one of those delightful day-dreams that we always loved to indulge in, whenever Flora displayed before us, as she did then, her choicest treasures, when suddenly, without premonition of any kind, there was a violent lurch of the boat, a creaking and a crushing noise abaft, a quick stoppage of the engine, all of which indicated that something unusual, if not serious, had befallen our ill-fated craft. A hasty examination showed that the steamer had collided with a sunken tree, and that several of the float-boards of the stern-wheel had been loosened, or partially wrenched from their places. After considerable delay the boatmen were able so to repair the damage that we were able to continue on our journey, although at a reduced speed.

Very shortly afterwards there was a second and a much severer crash. We had encountered another hidden tree. This time several of the float-boards were carried away from the wheel entirely, and the wheel itself was so racked that repair, while on the river, was quite impossible. Fortunately, as we were going down stream, we were able to float to the entrance of the canal that leads to the docks of Barranquilla. Here a crowd of stevedores from the town soon congregated. These men, mostly negroes, agreed, after some parleying, to haul the boat to the landing place. They, accordingly, took hold of a long rope, which was thrown ashore, and soon the disabled steamer was being conveyed to her moorings in the same fashion as a canal boat is drawn along by mules in tandem. Wereached the wharf the fifth day26after leaving Honda, just as the sun was setting, and when the customs officers were about to close their office for the night. They, however, kindly allowed us to disembark and we were soon on our way to a hotel.

“How fortunate,” C. exclaimed, “that this accident did not occur midway up the river!” Such a mishap would have entailed much suffering and might have delayed our arrival at Barranquilla, for days, if not for weeks. And considering our happy escape from the detentions and disasters from which so many others had suffered, and the peculiar episode that characterized our last hours on the Magdalena, we were forcibly reminded of the words of Dante:—

“Let not the people be too swift to judge.For I have seenA bark, that all her way across the seaRan straight and speedy, perish at the lastE’en in the haven’s mouth.”27

“Let not the people be too swift to judge.

For I have seen

A bark, that all her way across the sea

Ran straight and speedy, perish at the last

E’en in the haven’s mouth.”27

1“Hail, hail, majestic river!... Contemplating thee, adorned by the eldest of Earth’s sons; full only of thee, I feel my soul carried on by the foam of thy waves, which in deep whirlpools roar, absorbed in the giant works of that Being which embraces the infinite.”↑2The reader will be surprised to learn that the aggregate capacity of all the boats—champans included—at present plying on the Magdalena—proudly named by the people the Danube of Colombia—is not more than eleven thousand tons, about half the tonnage of one of our great transatlantic steamers.↑3Op. cit., 3a Noticia, Cap. IX.↑4The first mention, apparently, of the Magdalena, as distinguished from the Rio Grande, occurs in Benzoni’s work, already cited.↑5Called by the nativesCabeza de Negro—Negro-head—from the globular form of the spathe enclosing the nuts.↑6The introduction of the steamboat on the Magdalena will soon suppress the rude yet picturesque craft known as the champan. With it will disappear that interesting type of negro known as theboga. The boga is tall and robust, with the habits of a savage. He spends the greater part of his time in the champan, and his life as a punter is a strenuous one and full of danger. He speaks a barbarous jargon—currulao—composed of Spanish and of certain African and Indian dialects. His ideas of honor and honesty are not unlike those of similar people in other parts of the world. One can safely trust him with money and clothing, but, if the traveler have liquor of any kind with him, the boga will be sure to purloin it at the first opportunity. He is simple, frank, and brave. He sings during good weather, even while struggling against the current or fighting caymans, but he swears like a trooper during rain and thunder storms, especially when the lightning strikes near him. For him death is a very simple matter. A dead man to him is like a champan damaged beyond repair—something to be carried away by the all-devouring river.↑7The exact altitudes of the points named are as follows:—Cumbre Pass, between Chile and Argentina, 12,505 feet; Crucero Alto, between Arequipa and Lake Titicaca, 14,666 feet; Galera Tunnel, 15,665 feet. At Urbina, on the recently-completed railroad between Guayaquil and Quito, the height above sea level is 11,841 feet.↑8In Colombia, the white race, composed of the descendants of the conquistadores, most of whom have intermarried with the indigenous tribes, constitutes fifty per cent of the population. The negroes compose thirty-five and the Indians fifteen per cent. In Venezuela the descendants of Europeans are in the minority, while in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia the indigenes make up nearly two-thirds of the inhabitants.La Republique de Colombie, p. 44, par Ricardo Nuñez et Henry Jalahay, Bruxelles, 1898.↑9Albert Millican,Travels and Adventures of an Orchid Hunter, p. 118, London, 1891.↑10The noted English botanist, Spruce, expresses a similar idea when he writes, “I like to look on plants as sentient beings, which live and enjoy their lives—which beautify the earth during life, and after death may adorn my herbarium.”—Notes of a Botanist, and the Amazon and Andes, Chap. XXXIX, by Richard Spruce, London, 1908.↑11The route followed by Quesada from the Magdalena to the plateau of Bogotá has remained impassable for horses since the time of the conquest. To one familiar with the difficulties of the way, it seems impossible that so small a body of soldiers should ever have been able to take sixty horses with them and bring them all, with a single exception, in safety to the plains above. It may be safely doubted if such a feat could be accomplished now. But “there were giants in those days.”↑12The fact that the Spaniards found potatoes here on their arrival, and the further fact that there was never any communication, so far as known, between New Granada and Chile before the conquest, would seem to indicate that theSolanum tuberosummay have been, contrary to the opinion of Humboldt and De Candolle, indigenous to Colombia.↑13Op. cit., Dec. I, Book X.↑14Quesada’s infantry received as their share of the spoil, which had been secured, the equivalent of about $1,000. The cavalry received twice this amount.↑15In the province of Sinu the amount of treasure in gold and jewels secured in one day amounted to $300,000. Not without reason, then, was this part of the New World designated by the early geographers,Castilla del Oro—Golden Castile.↑16The Republic of Colombia, p. 59, London, 1906.Nothing is farther from my mind than to call in question the veracity of distinguished naturalists and travelers regarding any statements they may have made concerning the vast numbers of animals and birds seen by them in the equinoctial regions of South America. But my experience proves at least one thing and that is that one may travel a long time in the very heart of the tropics, and see very little of its fauna, even in those parts in which it is generally supposed that there are always representatives of many kinds and that, too, in great numbers.↑17The following sentence affords an interesting commentary on the occasional rarity of certain animals which are usually supposed to be always visible in large numbers, especially in the Magdalena.“I have read much of the number of alligators on the Magdalena, but have not seen one.”—The Journal of an Expedition Across Venezuela and Colombia, p. 264, 1906–7, by Hiram Bingham, New Haven. 1909.Raleigh says he saw in Guiana thousands of these “vglie serpants” calledLagartos.↑18Mr. R. L. Ditmars, Curator of Reptiles in the New York Zoological Park, in his interesting work,The Reptile Book, writes as follows of the crocodile: “The sight of a child will send a twelve-foot specimen rushing from its basking place for the water, and a man may even bathe in safety in rivers frequented by the species. The dangerous ‘man-eating’ crocodiles inhabit India and Africa.” P. 91. Compare Schomburgk, inRaleigh’s Discovery of Guiana, p. 57.↑19If the slaughter of the alligator in the Gulf States continues for a few years longer, at the rate which has prevailed during the past few decades, the reptile will be exterminated. According to theBulletin of the U. S. Fish Commission, XI, 1891, p. 343, it is estimated that 2,500,000 were killed in Florida between 1880 and 1894.↑20Dec. II, Book 9.↑21Dec. I, Book 9.↑22TheCeroxylon andicolaand theKunthia montanagrow at altitudes of from 6,000 to 9,000 feet, and, according to Humboldt, palms are found in the Paramo de Guanucos, 13,000 feet above sea level.↑23Historia Naturalis Palmarum, Tom. I, p. 156, Lipsiæ. 1850.↑24The countries here mentioned, especially Palestine, are now comparatively bare of palms.↑25According to a legend, this was the first date-palm seen in Spain, and was planted by the calif himself, in front of his palace, as a souvenir of his early home.↑26Quesada and his companions made their celebrated voyage from Guatiqui to the mouth of the river, a distance of nearly seven hundred miles, in twelve days. Considering that they had only rudely-constructed brigantines and dugouts, their trip, compared with ours made in a steamboat under the most favorable conditions in but little less than half the time, was truly remarkable.↑27Paradiso, Canto XIII, 130 et 136–138.↑

1“Hail, hail, majestic river!... Contemplating thee, adorned by the eldest of Earth’s sons; full only of thee, I feel my soul carried on by the foam of thy waves, which in deep whirlpools roar, absorbed in the giant works of that Being which embraces the infinite.”↑

2The reader will be surprised to learn that the aggregate capacity of all the boats—champans included—at present plying on the Magdalena—proudly named by the people the Danube of Colombia—is not more than eleven thousand tons, about half the tonnage of one of our great transatlantic steamers.↑

3Op. cit., 3a Noticia, Cap. IX.↑

4The first mention, apparently, of the Magdalena, as distinguished from the Rio Grande, occurs in Benzoni’s work, already cited.↑

5Called by the nativesCabeza de Negro—Negro-head—from the globular form of the spathe enclosing the nuts.↑

6The introduction of the steamboat on the Magdalena will soon suppress the rude yet picturesque craft known as the champan. With it will disappear that interesting type of negro known as theboga. The boga is tall and robust, with the habits of a savage. He spends the greater part of his time in the champan, and his life as a punter is a strenuous one and full of danger. He speaks a barbarous jargon—currulao—composed of Spanish and of certain African and Indian dialects. His ideas of honor and honesty are not unlike those of similar people in other parts of the world. One can safely trust him with money and clothing, but, if the traveler have liquor of any kind with him, the boga will be sure to purloin it at the first opportunity. He is simple, frank, and brave. He sings during good weather, even while struggling against the current or fighting caymans, but he swears like a trooper during rain and thunder storms, especially when the lightning strikes near him. For him death is a very simple matter. A dead man to him is like a champan damaged beyond repair—something to be carried away by the all-devouring river.↑

7The exact altitudes of the points named are as follows:—Cumbre Pass, between Chile and Argentina, 12,505 feet; Crucero Alto, between Arequipa and Lake Titicaca, 14,666 feet; Galera Tunnel, 15,665 feet. At Urbina, on the recently-completed railroad between Guayaquil and Quito, the height above sea level is 11,841 feet.↑

8In Colombia, the white race, composed of the descendants of the conquistadores, most of whom have intermarried with the indigenous tribes, constitutes fifty per cent of the population. The negroes compose thirty-five and the Indians fifteen per cent. In Venezuela the descendants of Europeans are in the minority, while in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia the indigenes make up nearly two-thirds of the inhabitants.La Republique de Colombie, p. 44, par Ricardo Nuñez et Henry Jalahay, Bruxelles, 1898.↑

9Albert Millican,Travels and Adventures of an Orchid Hunter, p. 118, London, 1891.↑

10The noted English botanist, Spruce, expresses a similar idea when he writes, “I like to look on plants as sentient beings, which live and enjoy their lives—which beautify the earth during life, and after death may adorn my herbarium.”—Notes of a Botanist, and the Amazon and Andes, Chap. XXXIX, by Richard Spruce, London, 1908.↑

11The route followed by Quesada from the Magdalena to the plateau of Bogotá has remained impassable for horses since the time of the conquest. To one familiar with the difficulties of the way, it seems impossible that so small a body of soldiers should ever have been able to take sixty horses with them and bring them all, with a single exception, in safety to the plains above. It may be safely doubted if such a feat could be accomplished now. But “there were giants in those days.”↑

12The fact that the Spaniards found potatoes here on their arrival, and the further fact that there was never any communication, so far as known, between New Granada and Chile before the conquest, would seem to indicate that theSolanum tuberosummay have been, contrary to the opinion of Humboldt and De Candolle, indigenous to Colombia.↑

13Op. cit., Dec. I, Book X.↑

14Quesada’s infantry received as their share of the spoil, which had been secured, the equivalent of about $1,000. The cavalry received twice this amount.↑

15In the province of Sinu the amount of treasure in gold and jewels secured in one day amounted to $300,000. Not without reason, then, was this part of the New World designated by the early geographers,Castilla del Oro—Golden Castile.↑

16The Republic of Colombia, p. 59, London, 1906.

Nothing is farther from my mind than to call in question the veracity of distinguished naturalists and travelers regarding any statements they may have made concerning the vast numbers of animals and birds seen by them in the equinoctial regions of South America. But my experience proves at least one thing and that is that one may travel a long time in the very heart of the tropics, and see very little of its fauna, even in those parts in which it is generally supposed that there are always representatives of many kinds and that, too, in great numbers.↑

17The following sentence affords an interesting commentary on the occasional rarity of certain animals which are usually supposed to be always visible in large numbers, especially in the Magdalena.

“I have read much of the number of alligators on the Magdalena, but have not seen one.”—The Journal of an Expedition Across Venezuela and Colombia, p. 264, 1906–7, by Hiram Bingham, New Haven. 1909.

Raleigh says he saw in Guiana thousands of these “vglie serpants” calledLagartos.↑

18Mr. R. L. Ditmars, Curator of Reptiles in the New York Zoological Park, in his interesting work,The Reptile Book, writes as follows of the crocodile: “The sight of a child will send a twelve-foot specimen rushing from its basking place for the water, and a man may even bathe in safety in rivers frequented by the species. The dangerous ‘man-eating’ crocodiles inhabit India and Africa.” P. 91. Compare Schomburgk, inRaleigh’s Discovery of Guiana, p. 57.↑

19If the slaughter of the alligator in the Gulf States continues for a few years longer, at the rate which has prevailed during the past few decades, the reptile will be exterminated. According to theBulletin of the U. S. Fish Commission, XI, 1891, p. 343, it is estimated that 2,500,000 were killed in Florida between 1880 and 1894.↑

20Dec. II, Book 9.↑

21Dec. I, Book 9.↑

22TheCeroxylon andicolaand theKunthia montanagrow at altitudes of from 6,000 to 9,000 feet, and, according to Humboldt, palms are found in the Paramo de Guanucos, 13,000 feet above sea level.↑

23Historia Naturalis Palmarum, Tom. I, p. 156, Lipsiæ. 1850.↑

24The countries here mentioned, especially Palestine, are now comparatively bare of palms.↑

25According to a legend, this was the first date-palm seen in Spain, and was planted by the calif himself, in front of his palace, as a souvenir of his early home.↑

26Quesada and his companions made their celebrated voyage from Guatiqui to the mouth of the river, a distance of nearly seven hundred miles, in twelve days. Considering that they had only rudely-constructed brigantines and dugouts, their trip, compared with ours made in a steamboat under the most favorable conditions in but little less than half the time, was truly remarkable.↑

27Paradiso, Canto XIII, 130 et 136–138.↑

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