Indeed, I Do Not
Believe The Inhumanity Of Separating Thirty Families, Who
Had Lived Together For Many Years, Even Occurred To The
Owner.
Yet I will pledge myself, that in humanity and
good feeling he was superior to the common run of men.
It may be said there exists no limit to the blindness of interest
and selfish habit.
I may mention one very trifling anecdote,
which at the time struck me more forcibly than any
story of cruelty. I was crossing a ferry with a negro, who
was uncommonly stupid. In endeavouring to make him
understand, I talked loud, and made signs, in doing which I
passed my hand near his face. He, I suppose, thought I was
in a passion, and was going to strike him; for instantly,
with a frightened look and half-shut eyes, he dropped his
hands. I shall never forget my feelings of surprise, disgust,
and shame, at seeing a great powerful man afraid even to
ward off a blow, directed, as he thought, at his face. This
man had been trained to a degradation lower than the
slavery of the most helpless animal.
April 18th. - In returning we spent two days at Socego,
and I employed them in collecting insects in the forest. The
greater number of trees, although so lofty, are not more
than three or four feet in circumference. There are, of
course, a few of much greater dimensions. Senhor Manuel
was then making a canoe 70 feet in length from a solid trunk,
which had originally been 110 feet long, and of great thickness.
The contrast of palm trees, growing amidst the common
branching kinds, never fails to give the scene an intertropical
character. Here the woods were ornamented by the
Cabbage Palm - one of the most beautiful of its family. With
a stem so narrow that it might be clasped with the two
hands, it waves its elegant head at the height of forty or
fifty feet above the ground. The woody creepers, themselves
covered by other creepers, were of great thickness: some
which I measured were two feet in circumference. Many of
the older trees presented a very curious appearance from
the tresses of a liana hanging from their boughs, and resembling
bundles of hay. If the eye was turned from the world
of foliage above, to the ground beneath, it was attracted by
the extreme elegance of the leaves of the ferns and mimosae.
The latter, in some parts, covered the surface with a brushwood
only a few inches high. In walking across these thick
beds of mimosae, a broad track was marked by the change
of shade, produced by the drooping of their sensitive petioles.
It is easy to specify the individual objects of admiration in
these grand scenes; but it is not possible to give an adequate
idea of the higher feelings of wonder, astonishment, and
devotion, which fill and elevate the mind.
April 19th. - Leaving Socego, during the two first days,
we retraced our steps. It was very wearisome work, as the
road generally ran across a glaring hot sandy plain, not
far from the coast. I noticed that each time the horse put
its foot on the fine siliceous sand, a gentle chirping noise
was produced. On the third day we took a different line,
and passed through the gay little village of Madre de Deos.
This is one of the principal lines of road in Brazil; yet it
was in so bad a state that no wheeled vehicle, excepting the
clumsy bullock-wagon, could pass along. In our whole journey
we did not cross a single bridge built of stone; and
those made of logs of wood were frequently so much out of
repair, that it was necessary to go on one side to avoid them.
All distances are inaccurately known. The road is often
marked by crosses, in the place of milestones, to signify
where human blood has been spilled. On the evening of the
23rd we arrived at Rio, having finished our pleasant little
excursion.
During the remainder of my stay at Rio, I resided in a
cottage at Botofogo Bay. It was impossible to wish for
anything more delightful than thus to spend some weeks
in so magnificent a country. In England any person fond
of natural history enjoys in his walks a great advantage, by
always having something to attract his attention; but in
these fertile climates, teeming with life, the attractions are
so numerous, that he is scarcely able to walk at all.
The few observations which I was enabled to make were
almost exclusively confined to the invertebrate animals. The
existence of a division of the genus Planaria, which inhabits
the dry land, interested me much. These animals are of so
simple a structure, that Cuvier has arranged them with the
intestinal worms, though never found within the bodies of
other animals. Numerous species inhabit both salt and fresh
water; but those to which I allude were found, even in the
drier parts of the forest, beneath logs of rotten wood, on
which I believe they feed. In general form they resemble
little slugs, but are very much narrower in proportion, and
several of the species are beautifully coloured with
longitudinal stripes. Their structure is very simple: near the
middle of the under or crawling surface there are two small
transverse slits, from the anterior one of which a funnel-
shaped and highly irritable mouth can be protruded. For
some time after the rest of the animal was completely dead
from the effects of salt water or any other cause, this organ
still retained its vitality.
I found no less than twelve different species of terrestrial
Planariae in different parts of the southern hemisphere. [3]
Some specimens which I obtained at Van Dieman's Land,
I kept alive for nearly two months, feeding them on rotten
wood. Having cut one of them transversely into two nearly
equal parts, in the course of a fortnight both had the shape
of perfect animals.
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