Across Unknown South America

CHAPTER XXIII

The Jangada River—Demented Descendants of Slaves—Appalling Degeneration—Giant Monoliths—The River Roncador—Gigantic Natural Gateways—The Discovery of Fossils

We had reached the end of the comparatively flat plateau, which varied in elevation on its summit from 2,530 ft. to 2,570 ft. above the sea level. We were next faced by a most precipitous descent in order to go down to the Jangada River—which eventually flowed into the distant Rio Cuyaba. There was, of course, no trail of any kind, and the course of the descent before us was not unlike trying to take our animals down the almost vertical wall of a fortress. With picks and spades we cut a narrow path for a short distance in order to start the reluctant beasts down. I recommended the greatest care to my men, but instead of following my instructions they drove the rebellious quadrupeds with their whips in a heap along the path—only a few inches wide—which we had cut. Result: Collisions among the animals and against the wall, and, next, five mules and baggage rolled down the mountain-side at a vertiginous speed until they had reached the bottom, some hundreds of feet below. Antonio, the strong man of the party, who tried to go to the rescue of one of the animals, was also dragged down, and came within an ace of losing his life. He was able to embrace a shrub with all his might just before rolling over the precipice, and we rescued him. We had to waste a great deal of time cutting an improvised way in the mountain side. Then we had to unload all the animals and convey the loads down on men's heads. Each animal was then with great difficulty and danger led by hand down to the stream.

Great quantities of beautiful marble and crystals were met with, and masses of lava pellets and ferruginous rock. In the Jangada valley we found two hot springs emerging from the side of the plateau from which we had descended. I discovered there two miserable tiny sheds belonging to a family of escaped negro slaves. They had lived seventeen years in that secluded spot. They grew enough Indian corn to support them. All the members of the family were pitifully deformed and demented. Seldom have I seen such miserable-looking specimens of humanity. One was demented to such an extent that it was impossible to get out of him more than a few disconnected groans. He spent most of his time crouched like an animal, and hardly seemed conscious of what took place round him. Another was a deaf and dumb crÉtin; a third possessed a monstrous hare-lip and a deformed jaw; while two women, dried up and skinny, and a child were badly affected by goÏtre. For a single family that seemed a melancholy spectacle.

How Author's Animals rolled down Trailless Ravines.

It was really pitiable—everywhere in the interior of Brazil—wherever you came across a family, to find that all its members were crÉtins, and deformed to such an extent as to make them absolutely repulsive. Frequently I had noticed among the common abnormalities supernumerary fingers and toes. One child at this place, in fact, had six toes to each foot, besides being an idiot, deaf and dumb, and affected by goÏtre. The only one of the family who was able to realize what took place was terrified at our approach, and never got over his terror as long as we remained. He suffered from the illusion that everybody wished to murder him. For some reason or other he believed that I had come specially, all the way from my own country, in order to search for him and kill him. All the most considerate words on my part, the showering of presents, had no effect upon him. He sat some way off, watching me attentively all the time, and whenever I moved my hands in any direction he dashed away shrieking, thinking that I should attempt to strangle him—for his mania was death by strangulation. After a while he returned, and in his broken, almost unintelligible language—his tongue was nearly paralyzed and he had difficulty in articulating properly—begged to be spared.

Those people lived worse than animals—in an appallingly filthy condition, in two miserable, tumble-down sheds, open on all sides, and not more than 8 ft. high. They were reduced to that condition by intermarriage among themselves; brothers with sisters—a most frequent occurrence among the "civilized" of Central Brazil—and even fathers with daughters and sons with their mothers: a disgusting state of affairs which could not very well be helped in a race and in a climate where the animal qualities were extraordinarily developed while the mental were almost entirely deficient. Worse still, I had several cases under observation in which the animal passions had not been limited to closely related human beings, but extended also to animals, principally dogs. The degeneration of those people was indeed beyond all conception. It was caused, first of all, by the effects of the most terrible corruption of their blood, their subsequent impoverishment of blood through intermarriage, the miserable isolated existence which they led on scarce and bad food, the exposure to all kinds of weather, and the absolute lack of thought—almost paralyzing the brain power. It was heart-rending to think that human beings could possibly degenerate to so low a level, and—what was worse—that beings of that kind were extraordinarily prolific; so that, instead of being exterminated—which would be a mercy for the country—they were in a small way on the increase.

I camped near the sheds of that "happy family," having gone 42 kil. from the Rio das Mortes. I felt sad the whole night, watching them unperceived. It upset me so that I was ill for several days.

The Rio Jangada, at an altitude of 1,550 ft., was 1,000 ft. lower than the top of the plateau. The river flowed west into the CuyabÁ River. We crossed the stream, a rapid and foaming torrent. We soon began to climb again on the opposite side over sweeping undulations. We waded through two more streamlets flowing west—the second at an elevation of 1,650 ft. We were travelling partly among campos on the summit of cones and domes, partly through brush or scrub in the depressions. We struggled on, urging the tired animals, rising gradually to 2,150 ft., then to 2,200 ft., over soil strewn with volcanic pebbles and scoriÆ. During the night the minimum temperature had been 53° Fahr., but during the day the sun was extremely hot and powerful, and animals and men were sweating freely. We marched northward, then slightly to the north-west, leaving behind, to the south-west of us, two quadrangular table-lands, rising above the undulating line of a depression.

Shortly after, to the E.N.E., we perceived the section of an extinct crater—the easterly point of its summit being in itself a semicircular subsidiary crater. On one side of the greater crater was a conical depression, at the bottom of which (elev. 2,400 ft.) was an extensive bed of lava blocks of great size—hundreds of monolithic rocks standing up like pillars. In fact, they stood all along the side of the crater as well as inside it. Surrounding a pyramidal hill a group of those huge pillars looked—to a casual observer—just like the ruins of a tumble-down abbey.

Three hours' journey from our camp we reached the summit of a dome (elev. 2,500 ft.). Beyond it was a cuvette with its typical central line of burity palms.

To the west we perceived a marvellous view of three immense dykes of red rock—like walls—stretching from south-west to north-east; then two more great perpendicular dykes of granite were disclosed close by.

Going over domes 2,550 ft. and 2,450 ft. above the sea level, we obtained a vast and immense view of the serradÃo—wild country—before us, a regular ocean of deep green undulations rising quite high to the south; whereas to the north there extended a long plateau with a deep ravine on its southern aspect.

We descended through scrub (elev. 2,400 ft.)—what the Brazilians call serradÃo—and through a growth of stunted trees (elev. 2,450 ft.) to so low an altitude as 2,300 ft. Going along a rocky cliff, we passed a strange volcanic vent-hole with a pyramid of granite of large proportions on each side of its aperture.

We arrived at the Roncador, a picturesque torrent flowing over a bed of lava moulded in the strangest possible shapes, hollows, terraces and grottoes. Most peculiar were the great concave hollows, circular, oval, and of irregular form, which were innumerable and of all sizes along that extensive flow of lava.

Hideous Types characteristic of Central Brazil.

Two women (left) and two men (right).

We had travelled 30 kil. that day. That was such a picturesque spot that I made camp on the right bank of the torrent. We were all amazed to find an immense block of rock—resembling in size and form the Sphinx of Egypt—balanced to a nicety over the edge of a conical rocky hill. It was, of course, the work of nature. Why that rock remained there at all and did not tumble down, was more than we could understand. There was also a giant monolith and other strange-looking rocks of great size standing up at all angles close by. On climbing the hill where the Sphinx-like rock stood, I discovered a circular crater of great beauty, 300 metres in diameter. The western wall of the crater had been knocked down, but on the eastern inner side, in the central part 150 ft. high, there was a precipitous fall, then a huge smooth inclined plane of lava at an angle of 15° overlapping the top, where it had subsequently been subjected either to violent earthquake shocks or other disturbing influences, as it was badly seamed and fissured. Many segments had crumbled down, leaving the remaining portion of a most extraordinary shape. In the centre of the crater there stood a huge mass of rock 150 ft. high, which looked like an inclined table—a giant slab cleanly cut at its angles, which protruded at great length outside the base formed by broken-up blocks. On looking west from the summit of the extinct volcano one obtained a marvellous view of the vertical cliffs between which the Roncador River flowed.

Then there was a great table-land extending from north to south, composed of red volcanic rock and white limestone. A separate red quadrangular castle-like structure of immense proportions rose in the middle foreground in the north-west upon a conical green grassy base.

Add to this wonderful work of Nature a magnificent sky of gold and brilliant vermilion, as limpid as limpid could be, and you will perhaps imagine why I could not move from the rock on which I sat gazing at that magnificent, almost awe-inspiring, spectacle. Night came on swiftly, as it always does in those latitudes, and I scrambled down the hill, among the sharp, cutting, slippery, shiny rocks, arriving in camp minus a good many patches of skin upon my shins and knuckles.

At the point where I crossed the Roncador River there were three handsome waterfalls in succession, the central one in two terraces, some 90 ft. high. At the foot of the two-tiered waterfall was a great circular basin which had all the appearance of having been formerly a volcanic vent. The flowing water, which tumbled down with terrific force, had further washed its periphery smooth. The centre of the basin was of immense depth. Directly under the fall a spacious grotto was to be seen under a huge projecting rock.

The elevation of the stream above the falls was 2,150 ft., below the falls 2,060 ft. The temperature of the atmosphere was 72° Fahr., and the minimum temperature during the night 58° Fahr.

The Roncador flowed from north-east to south-west as far as the foot of the great plateau we had observed during our march. There, on meeting the great vertical wall, its course was diverted in a northerly direction and then again to the north-west, where the stream eventually fell into the CuyabÁ River. The Rio Jangada, on which we had camped the previous day, was a tributary of the Roncador, and so was the streamlet called Pedra Grande, which entered the Roncador on its right side. The Pedra Grande took its name from an immense monolith, worn quite smooth, near its bank.

From the Roncador we continued on our northerly course. The western view of the "balanced Sphinx boulder" was indeed remarkable. It seemed to stand up on a small pivot despite all the laws of gravitation, the heaviest side of the upper rock projecting far out on one side with nothing to balance it on the other.

Cutting our way easily in the scrub, we rose to 2,300 ft. over a flow of red lava (it had flowed in an easterly direction) in several successive strata. The upper stratum was grooved into geometrical patterns, such as we had met before, wherever it showed through the thin layer of red volcanic sand which covered most of it. We were there in a zone of immense natural pillars of rock, some of such great height that they were visible miles off along the range—which extended from south to north, parallel, in fact, to the course we were following.

Still proceeding due north, we arrived on the summit of a great dome, 2,500 ft., from which point we had to alter our course to the north-west, owing to an isolated impassable barrier which we left on our right (north). It had steep slopes but well-rounded terminal points. It extended from N.N.E. to S.S.W., and had a height of some 150 ft. above the flat serradÃo, on which my skeleton-like mules wended their way among the stunted trees, the bells dangling from their necks monotonously tinkling—not the gay, brisk tinkling of animals full of life, as when we had left Goyaz, but the weak, mournful sound—ding ... ding ... ding—of tired, worn-out beasts, stumbling along anyhow. Occasionally one heard the crashing of broken branches or of trees collapsing at the collision with the packs, or the violent braying of the animals when stung in sensitive parts by an extra-violent fly; otherwise there was silence, the silence of death, all round us.

The poor brutes tore mouthfuls of grass, now on one side then on the other, as they went along; but the grazing was poor in the serradÃo, and the animals found only enough to subsist upon. Two of them were absolutely disabled, owing to accidents we had had; and, with the animals I had lost, this involved loading extra heavily those still able to carry. The constant collisions against the stunted trees in that trail-less region injured the animals considerably and caused nasty sores and swellings all over their bodies. I saw well that the poor beasts would not last much longer. It was impossible to halt a sufficient time to let them recover in that particular region, with food so scarce—it would have taken them months. In the meantime our provisions were being fast consumed—or rather wasted—and we had thousands of kilometres to go yet. My men never suspected this, or they would have never come on; but I knew only too well.

They still insisted on marching with their loaded rifles, fully cocked, resting horizontally upon their shoulders; and as we marched naturally in single file, and as we used cordite cartridges with bullets of high penetration, there was still a prospect of a bullet going through one or more of us. Once or twice again a rifle went off unexpectedly by accident. It would have been terrible for any one of a nervous temperament to be travelling with such companions. On previous expeditions I had generally trusted in myself, but on this particular one I was so disgusted that I had made up my mind to trust in Providence alone. I did well, for had I done otherwise I might have fared much worse than I did.

We went over a pass (elev. 2,400 ft.) between two small domes, quite barren but for a scanty growth of short dried grass. We were marching over masses of lava and conglomerate with innumerable marble pellets. We found ourselves within a regular circle of low hills enclosing a shallow depression. Subsequently we came to a second and then to a third similar depression.

Author's Caravan marching across Trailless Country.

The Roncador River.

Continuing in a north-westerly direction we again obtained a gorgeous view of the treble portal—by which word the Brazilians describe a monumental entrance of any kind. That is just what those three immense gaps in the plateau looked like: an immense wall of rock forming a high barrier, with three gigantic natural gateways.

After finding a stream of good water on the west side of the plateau we rose again higher, obtaining a splendid bird's-eye view of the picturesque depression we had just crossed. The effects of erosion following those of volcanic activity were evident enough upon the entire landscape. On the west side we had a horseshoe-shaped vertical wall—seemingly containing an extinct crater—and yet another on the north side of the western end of the elongated ellipse which was there formed.

With some difficulty we managed to get the animals up to the summit of the plateau (elev. 2,580 ft.). From there we obtained a sumptuous view beyond. An immense dyke of brilliant red rock, flat-topped, lay majestically to the west. At its foot the Rio Pedra Grande had its birth, and then flowed westward into the Rio Roncador. Four gigantic flat table-lands stood impressively in a line. Three more, equally impressive, loomed in the south-west. Other minor ones, quite wall-like—rectangular in vertical section—appeared in the blue distance, while the horizon was barred by a long flat plateau.

Looking north as we descended from the table-land, we found on our left another extinct crater—semicircular in shape, with several superimposed strata of lava, each about one foot thick, capping its lip, which was broken up into three sections. The valley below that crater formed a cuvette, the bottom of which (elev. 2,200 ft.) showed deep erosion by water in one or two places. Sand covered the lava-flow which had travelled northward. Quantities of heavy, spherical, bullet-like blocks of hard-baked rock were scattered all about—evidently shot out of the crater when active.

We had travelled 80 kil. from Cayambola in three days, and we had reached a spot of slight, well-rounded undulations where grazing was fair. I decided to halt early in the afternoon—more particularly as this spot appeared to me to have been at one time or other submerged—probably it had been a lake bottom. I had, since the beginning of my journey, been searching everywhere for fossils—but in vain. I had not seen the vestiges of a single one. Personally, I was persuaded that Central Brazil could well be geologically classified in the archaic group—the most ancient of the terrestrial crust, and consisting (in Brazil) chiefly of gneiss, mica schists and granite, solidified into their present form by intense eruptive phenomena and dissolved—not by immersion in ocean waters, as some suppose, but by deluges of such potentiality as the human mind can hardly conceive.

It was quite enough to visit the central plateau of Brazil to be persuaded that that continent had never been submerged under a sea; on the contrary, it must have been the oven of the world. The volcanic activity which must have taken place in that part of the world—it was not a separate continent in those days—was quite, as I have said, beyond human conception. This does not mean that at later periods there may not have been temporary lakes—as, for instance, in the spot where we encamped that night—or portions of country which had become flooded, upon the cooling of the earth, and subsequently became drained and dry again.

A wonderful surprise awaited me that day. To the north of my camp was a peculiar round mound. I climbed it, and what was my astonishment in the short ascent to find near the summit, among a lot of lava pellets, marble fragments, crystals, and great lumps of iron ore, a number of vertebrÆ from the tail and spine of a giant reptile! The vertebrÆ had been disjointed and scattered somewhat about by wind and water—but there they were; the smaller ones on the side of the hill, the larger on the summit—which led me to believe that the animal had crouched on the top of the hill when dying. Some of the fossil vertebrÆ were so large and heavy that I hardly had the strength to lift them up. The bones—petrified—were of a beautiful white. Many of them had, unfortunately, become so fractured as to make identification difficult. On following the line of the dorsal vertebrÆ—somewhat scattered about—I came upon some vertebrÆ which appeared to me to be cervical vertebrÆ; and then, behold my joy! in searching around the summit of the mound I perceived the skull. The skull was so big and heavy that I could not carry it away, but I took several photographs and careful drawings of it from all sides.

It was curiously shaped—quite unlike any other fossil skull I have seen. The cranial region proper was extremely short, with smallish round orbits rather low down on the side of the head. The skull had an elongated shape: 35 cm. was its total length; 10 cm. its maximum transverse breadth, and 5 cm. at the central and widest part of palate. The skull itself, with an elongated nasal bone, had a flattened point almost like a beak, or more probably like the base of a proboscis. The front part of the nose had unfortunately become fractured and ended with a flattened segment. A marked arch or hump stood prominent upon the nasal bone. The temporal arcades were quite developed, with prominent supra-orbital bosses. The orbital hollows were 5½ cm. in diameter, whereas the external nares were 9½ cm., the protrusion in front of the nostrils being 10 cm. long. The palate, of great length, had a peculiar complex shape, like a much-elongated U with another smaller U attached to it in the centre of its curve, Symbol..

The skull had been worn down by age and weathering. Moreover, one side of the upper part of the cranium had been entirely destroyed—seemingly by having rested on red-hot lava. Many of the vertebrÆ were equally injured. By even a superficial examination it was easy to reconstruct the tragedy which had taken place on that hillock thousands upon thousands of years ago.

Searching about, I came upon another skull of a huge reptile, and a number of smaller vertebrÆ than those belonging to the animal above described. The second skull was much flattened, of an elongated shape, very broad, the orbital cavity being high up on the skull—in fact, not unlike the skull of a great serpent. It possessed a long occipital spur, extraordinarily prominent, and fairly well-defined zygomatic arches—but not quite so prominent as in the skull previously discovered. Seen from underneath, there seemed to be a circular cavity on the left front, as if it had contained a large fang. This skull, too, was also much damaged on one side, where it had rested on some burning matter—evidently lava or lapilli. The skull measured longitudinally 48 cm. and was 23 cm. broad. Seen from underneath it resembled a much elongated lozenge.

Although I searched a great deal I could not find the lower mandibles of these two skulls, nor loose teeth—but many indeed were the fossilized fragments of bones of other animals strewn all over the hill-top. I found up there quite a sufficient quantity to make the summit of that hill look of a whitish colour. That was why I had been attracted to it at first sight, and had climbed it in order to discover why it was so white. One immense bone—fractured—was the pelvis of the larger animal. Nearly all those fossils were in terrible preservation, much damaged by fire and water. Some were so eroded as to be quite unidentifiable.

Most interesting of all to me were two smaller skulls—one of a mammal not unlike a leopard or jaguar, the other of an ape or perhaps a primitive human being. The latter cranium, like all the others, had one side completely destroyed by hot lava, which in this instance had also filled up a considerable portion of the brain-case. The human skull was small and under-developed, no sutures showing; the forehead extremely low and slanting, almost flattened, with the superciliary region and glabella very prominent. One of the orbits (the right) was badly damaged. The left, in perfect preservation, was oval, very deep. The form of the palate was of a broad U-shape—abnormally broad for the size of the head. The upper jaw was fairly high and prominent, whereas the zygomatic arch on the left (the right was destroyed) was not unduly prominent—in fact, rather small and less projecting than the supra-orbital region. Of the nasal bone only just a fragment remained. The brain-case was small but well-rounded at the back, where it had comparatively a fairly good breadth behind the auditory meatus.

In my anxiety and enthusiasm, I used up, in photographing the first skull I found, the only two photographic plates which remained that day in the camera I had brought with me up there. In order to obtain a fuller view of the skull on the negatives I placed it on a rudimentary stand I constructed with broken branches of a tree. The sun had already set when I discovered the two smaller skulls, and in any case I should not have been able to photograph them that day. Well recognizing their immense value, I enveloped them in my coat, which I turned into a kind of sack by tying the sleeves together, and, with a number of vertebrÆ and a knee-joint I had collected, proceeded to carry the entire load, weighing some sixty pounds, back to camp, a mile away.

On my arrival there I met with a good deal of derision from my ignorant men. I was faced with a problem. Had I told the men the immense value of those fossils, I feared they might be tempted to steal them and sell them whenever we first reached a civilized spot—which, true enough, might not be for many months; a fact my men did not know and never for one moment realized. If I did not tell them, I should have to stand their silly derision as long as the journey should last—for they openly and loudly argued among themselves the view that I had gone mad, and what better proof could they have than my carrying a heavy load of "ugly stones" as my personal baggage?

Of the two I came to the conclusion that derision was better than being robbed. So I took no one into my confidence. I merely stored the fossils carefully away in a large leather case, meaning to take them out some day to photograph them as a precaution in case of loss. Unfortunately the opportunity never offered itself, for we made forced marches every day, from early morning until dark, and unpacking and repacking were very inconvenient—each package having loops of rope fastened round, in order to be readily attached to the saddles, which took much time and trouble to undo. Then the ridicule of my men each time the "ugly stones" were referred to also kept me at first from unduly attracting their attention to them. With the many things I had to occupy my time day and night I ended by forgetting to take the photographs—greatly owing to being almost certain that I should bring the skulls themselves safely back to Europe. But the unexpected always happens. We shall see later on how—after having carried those fossils safely for several months—they were, unknown to me, wilfully flung, together with a quantity of provisions, into a deep part of the Arinos River by my companions, and they were beyond recovery.

Greatly to my regret, we left that interesting spot the next morning. A drenching rain prevented my paying a second visit to the two hillocks where the fossil fragments were to be found, but I took the exact position of them, so that any further expedition could locate the spot with great ease.

It was interesting to note that a Brazilian expedition had discovered some fossil bones of a gigantic animal some 200 kil. south-west of that place, and other remains of a giant animal had been found by another Brazilian expedition on the banks of the Paranatinga River, some 400 or 500 kil. north-east of our position.

We were encamped on the bank of the Rio Pedra Grande—the stream of that name which we had passed that day being merely a tributary. During the night we had observed a double-ringed lunar halo. The moon was almost full. From the horizon directly under the moon were innumerable radiations, not converging toward the moon but, curiously enough, the first two at a tangent to the larger halo, the others at equal intervals on each side.

At sunrise, before the rain-storm began, we were treated to wonderful cloud and light effects. The lower portion of the sky, of brilliant yellow and vivid green, was surmounted by golden and red streaks of wonderful vividness. Later, over the great natural gateways, the sky formed itself into concentric arches of blazing yellow and red, rendered intensely luminous by contrast with the heavy black clouds which were fast collecting overhead. No sooner was the sun well above the horizon than we came in for a heavy downpour.

Fossil Skull of a Giant Animal discovered by Author.

(Side view.)

Fossil Skull of Giant Animal.

(Seen from underneath.)

The temperature had been higher (minimum 60° Fahr.) than usual during the night, and heavy. The elevation of our camp was 2,030 ft. above the sea level.

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