Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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His Name Was Zerepe, A Very Intelligent Young Indian,
Who Proved Highly Useful To Us In The Sequel, But Who Now Refused To
Accompany Us.
He was born in the Mission of Atures; but his father was
a Maco, and his mother a native of the nation of the Maypures.
He had
returned to the woods (al monte), and having lived some years with the
unsubdued Indians, he had thus acquired the knowledge of several
languages, and the missionary employed him as an interpreter. We
obtained with difficulty the pardon of this young man. "Without these
acts of severity," we were told, "you would want for everything. The
Indians of the Raudales and the Upper Orinoco are a stronger and more
laborious race than the inhabitants of the Lower Orinoco. They know
that they are much sought after at Angostura. If left to their own
will, they would all go down the river to sell their productions, and
live in full liberty among the whites. The Missions would be totally
deserted."
These reasons, I confess, appeared to me more specious than sound.
Man, in order to enjoy the advantages of a social state, must no doubt
sacrifice a part of his natural rights, and his original independence;
but, if the sacrifice imposed on him be not compensated by the
benefits of civilization, the savage, wise in his simplicity, retains
the wish of returning to the forests that gave him birth. It is
because the Indian of the woods is treated like a person in a state of
villanage in the greater part of the Missions, because he enjoys not
the fruit of his labours, that the Christian establishments on the
Orinoco remain deserts.
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