CHAPTER XVII.

HUNTING THE TAPIR.--AMONG THE CARIPUNA INDIANS.--ARRIVAL AT THE FALLS OF THE MADEIRA.--MAKING INDIA-RUBBER.

One day was much like another in the descent of the river, as the party was not disturbed by hostile natives, and met with no accidents of consequence. Frank was disappointed in his hopes of hunting-adventures, as the jaguars and pumas persisted in keeping out of sight, and utterly deprived the young gentleman of an opportunity to try his weapons.

Less powerful game abounded, however, since the tapir and the agouti were frequently encountered. The agouti is about the size of a rabbit, which it greatly resembles both in appearance and habits. When pursued it runs rapidly for a short distance and then tries to conceal itself; if it is captured it makes no resistance beyond a plaintive cry.

The tapir deserves a more extended notice than the agouti, as he is much larger, and resists the attacks of his enemies with a good deal of vigor. Fred's account of a fight with a tapir will give an idea of the characteristics of this animal.

"The tapir is very widely distributed through tropical South America, and is probably more generally hunted than any other denizen of the country. His favorite haunts are narrow gorges and moist ravines, and the forests on the banks of all streams, whether large or small, though he prefers the latter. He is like an Englishman in desiring a cold bath in the morning, and the first tapir we saw was seated up to his neck in the water, at a bend of the river. We had told Manuel to call us when a tapir was discovered, and early one morning he roused us.

"Frank threw on his garments very hastily, and seized his rifle for a shot at the beast. As he emerged from the tent our pilot whispered, 'anta' (the native name for tapir), and pointed directly ahead of our course. The men had stopped rowing, and were silently urging the raft towards the shore, where it would be concealed from what we hoped to make game of, by an intervening bush.

"The desired position was gained without disturbing the animal at his bath, and under cover of the bank we drew quite near. Only his head was visible; Frank aimed and fired, and the head disappeared. Soon it came to the surface, and there was a loud snort which showed that the beast had been thoroughly alarmed.

"The rowers now did their best, as further concealment was unnecessary. With loud cries they urged the raft forward, but the unwieldy concern could not be turned as quickly as the tapir was able to double on us. Fortunately for us, he only tried two or three times to double, or he would have escaped altogether; after these efforts he struck straight across the river, where we came up to him and were able to throw a harpoon into his back. He had been severely wounded by Frank, and after the harpoon was thrown he was easily secured. It is always desirable to harpoon a tapir after shooting him in the water, as he dives to the bottom, and if he dies there his body does not rise.

"We had tapir steaks for breakfast, and found them very good. They resembled beef, though they were rather more dry than that well-known article of food; we had been rather limited in our supply of fresh provisions, and consequently the tapir steak was not to be despised. The flesh of this animal is highly prized by the natives; it is eaten fresh, like beef or pork, and is preserved by drying or salting.

"But this is not the fight I was going to tell about. One day we stopped at a village where there was a tame tapir running among the houses; it was perfectly docile, and allowed the boys to ride on its back as often and as long as they liked. The alcalde of the village told us how it was caught, a few months' before, in a hunting-excursion, only a few miles from the place.

"The alcalde kept several dogs especially for hunting the tapir. The hunter takes his position in a canoe carefully concealed in the bushes near the end of a tapir's road. The tapir lays out his own path with the skill of an engineer; he goes along this path regularly every morning, from his haunt to his bath in the river, and then from the river to his haunt again. The dogs are let loose near the tapir's retreat, and the frightened animal runs to the river for safety.

"He dives and swims with great rapidity, but the hunter is generally successful in capturing him. He is shot or speared as he takes to the water, evading the dogs only to fall into the hands of his human enemy.

"On the occasion I speak of the alcalde had gone for his customary sport, and roused a tapir. The keeper of the dogs was with these animals, while the alcalde was waiting at the river ready to shoot the game when it appeared. But it happened to be a female anta, this time, and she had a young tapir with her. The male flees before the dogs, but the female with a cub does nothing of the sort; she remains in her lair and defends the little fellow, who crouches beneath her and indicates his alarm by short, shrill whistles. She never yields, and is a terrible foe for the dogs. Her teeth do effective work on any of them that come too near, and her powerful fore-legs crush their ribs as though they were made of paper.

"The alcalde waited, but the tapir did not come. At length one of his men appeared, and said that two of the six dogs had been killed by the tapir and another was severely hurt. They were young dogs, and had not shown proper caution; the old and experienced ones had refrained from venturing within reach of jaws or feet, and confined their attentions to barking at a safe distance.

"The alcalde hastened to the spot, and with his gun soon laid low the desperate animal. The young tapir was secured unhurt and brought home to the village. It was kindly treated, and in three days it followed its master around like a dog, and was perfectly domesticated. The animal lives on vegetable food (grass, fruit, and roots), and consequently he is easy to keep. This was the tame tapir that we saw; he was perfectly amiable in disposition, but his great size rendered him unsuitable to be maintained as a house pet, and he had been turned into the street to make his own living. I was told that the tame tapir never shows any disposition to return to his native wilds. In this respect he resembles the elephant, and I believe the naturalists class him in the elephant family.

"The alcalde had a houseful of pets, including several birds and monkeys, and, strangest of all, a snake. It was perfectly free, and was kept for killing rats, mice, lizards, and other things that were more destructive of the owner's property than is the snake. Manuel said it was a giboia, a species of boa constrictor; it is not poisonous, and when taken young is easily tamed. Frank was reminded of the rat-snake they had seen in Ceylon, and thought it must be the first cousin of the giboia."

Snakes are less common in South America than is generally supposed, though they are numerous enough for all practical purposes. There are one hundred and fifty species in all, while a similar area in tropical Asia contains three hundred varieties. Most of them are non-poisonous, but the proportion of venomous snakes is greater than in India or Ceylon.

The largest member of the serpent family is the boa; it has been found twenty-six feet long, though it rarely exceeds twenty feet. The largest of the boas can kill and swallow a small horse, while a goat or sheep forms only a comfortable mouthful. One of the most venomous is the coral, which haunts the cacao plantations, and has a fatal bite. Ammonia is used as an antidote to snake-bites, but the application must be made in a few minutes, before the poison is diffused in the blood. Doses of strong coffee, brandy, or some other stimulant will sometimes keep up the action of the heart and neutralize the effect of the poison until the victim is out of danger.

The alcalde showed some of the venomous snakes that he kept as curiosities, but wisely restrained of their liberty. Among them was a rattlesnake, which appeared to be identical with the rattlesnake of North America; a "parrot-snake" of a dull green color, which makes it difficult to discover among the grass and leaves, and a "surucucu," which does not belong to the valley of the Mamore, but inhabits the lower Amazon and the Rio Negro. The coral snake, already mentioned, was among them; he was a pretty serpent (if serpents can be called pretty), of a vermilion hue striped with black bands. The youths stood at a respectful distance while surveying the collection, and did not care for a near acquaintance.

Manuel said that serious accidents from the bites of snakes were far less frequent than might be supposed. Natives are the principal sufferers, partly for the reason that the number of Europeans is not large, and partly because they go constantly clothed, which is not the case with the natives. It is the same as in India and Ceylon, where thousands of natives die every year from snake-bites, while not half a dozen deaths of Europeans from this cause have occurred during the century.

They passed from the Beni into the Madeira, and found the river increased to double its former volume. Frank and Fred looked anxiously up the Madeira, and wished they could explore the stream to its source; but as the wish could not be gratified, they quickly dismissed it from their thoughts. Their pilot said they were in the country of the Caripuna Indians, and it was quite possible that some of these aboriginals would pay them a visit at their next halting-place.

"The Caripunas were formerly quite hostile to the white men," said Manuel, "and used to attack the boats that went up or down the river. With boats going down stream they could not do much, as the pilots keep in the middle of the current and float along with it, but in ascending the river it is necessary to keep close to the bank, and this was the opportunity for them to make trouble. They had a spite against the Mojos Indians, and the latter had great fear of the Caripunas, who had the reputation of roasting and eating their victims, whether they did so or not. But since the surveys were made for the railway, and trade on the river has increased, they have made no trouble; they have found that they can do better by being friendly to the white man, and begging what he has to give them."

While they were halted for breakfast three canoes put out from a nook on the opposite shore; two of them paddled across to where the raft was tied up, while the third went a little way up the stream and stopped near the bank, as if waiting to see what reception would be given to their friends. Each canoe contained two men and one woman, all wearing very little clothing, and having their hair thick and long, so as to cover the shoulders. They had bows and arrows in their canoes, but did not offer to use them or even to pick them up, with the exception of one Indian, who took his weapons over his shoulder and stepped on shore.

In spite of his scanty costume he was rather picturesque in appearance, as he had ornaments in his ears and a necklace of jaguar's claws hanging on his breast. By signs, he invited the party to visit their camp on the other side of the river; the rowers were timid about venturing there, but the Doctor quieted their fears by intimating, through Manuel and the pilot, that the weapons of the party were sufficient to defend them in case of trouble.

The Caripunas were given to understand that the visit would be made as soon as breakfast was over; they seemed perfectly satisfied with this arrangement, and returned to their canoes, where they sat until the meal was finished. The return of the boatmen to their oars was the signal for the Caripunas, who paddled on ahead and indicated the best place for landing.

The landing was made without difficulty, and the whole population of the village, some twenty or thirty men, women, and children, came out to meet the strangers. For fear of treachery, Dr. Bronson gave orders that none of the rowers should leave their places; Manuel was to remain standing by the side of the boat, and the three Americans were not to go more than a few yards from the shore, where the huts of the Indians stood about ten feet above the water's level.

An old man, who was evidently the chief of the tribe, came forward and led the way to an open shed between the two principal huts. It was evidently a place of public resort, and corresponded to the city hall or court-house of civilized lands. All the rest of the natives followed, and the conversation soon became as animated as it is possible to make it where neither party understands a word the other says. Frank observed that the skins of the natives were of a reddish-brown color, and the tallest of them did not exceed five feet eight inches in height.

Beads, small mirrors, fish-hooks, and similar barbaric goods were distributed in the shape of presents, and then our friends tried to make a bargain for whatever the Indians had to sell. Unfortunately they had only a few bows and arrows and some feathers from the birds of the forest; beyond these nothing was in the market; and as the natives were unwilling to part with their weapons, it required a good deal of persuasion and the display of the glittering baubles to secure their consent. With these trifles the strangers were compelled to be satisfied, and after a visit of an hour or more they returned to their boat and continued the voyage.

A curious fact was ascertained by Mr. Keller in his visit to the Caripunas, that they bury their dead in their houses, removing the earth of the floor for that purpose. When a space beneath a hut is occupied with graves the place is abandoned, and a new dwelling is erected elsewhere. This is deserted in its turn, under the same conditions.

The Caripunas are skilful hunters and fishermen; they cultivate the soil occasionally, but not often, depending for their vegetable food upon the products of the forest. Some attempts have been made to civilize this people, but they have not succeeded, except in convincing them that it is better to be on friendly terms with their neighbors than in open hostility.

When the travellers reached Guajara-Merim, the first of the falls of the Madeira, their contract with their boatmen terminated. The men were paid off, each one receiving a small present in addition to his wages, and the pilot a larger one, in proportion to his importance. There is a small village of Mojos Indians just above the falls, and their special occupation is to transport travellers and their property up or down the stream. Manuel opened negotiations, but they could not be rapidly pushed, as it is not the custom of this people to do anything in a hurry.

It took an entire day to finish the transaction. A "garitea," a boat of about four tons' burden and having a crew of twelve men, was engaged for the voyage to San Antonio, at the foot of the lowest rapid. In addition to the crew there was a thirteenth man as pilot or captain, one of the twelve being second in command. Some of the rapids may be passed without danger in descending the river, and without the necessity of unloading the cargo; at others the cargo must be taken out, and the empty boat navigated down the rapids; while at others both boat and cargo must be taken around over the land. The whole distance where the boats must be drawn overland is nearly three miles, while for more than two miles the cargoes must be taken out in order to save them from possible damage or loss.

Frank and Fred had plenty of time for studying the falls of the Madeira and making a short excursion into the forest in the vicinity, as another day was required for getting ready to start after the bargain had been concluded for the hire of the boat and its crew. We will refer to Fred's note-book for an account of what they saw and learned.

"There is a village of Caripuna Indians," wrote Fred, "a little way inland from the falls, and we paid it a visit. Most of the men were away on a fishing excursion, and the few that remained did not have anything we could buy. We made them some presents, but did not stay long, as we wanted to see a rubber-tree, and the manner of collecting the India-rubber of commerce.

"We had a guide from the Mojos village at the falls; he had been a collector of rubber, and spoke enough Spanish to enable us to understand his explanations. Since the surveys were made for the railway a good many Mojos Indians have settled here, and they do quite a business in collecting rubber and sending it down the river to market.

"The rubber-trees are abundant on both sides of the river for a long distance in either direction. How far inland they may be found is not definitely known. The scientific name of the tree is _Siphonia elastica_, or _Siphonia cachucha_, but there are several other trees that produce the gum which is so largely used in American and European industry. An incision is made in the side of the tree, and a cup made of leaves and clay is so placed as to catch the juice which flows from the cut. In a few hours the cup is filled, and a man comes around with a large jar in which the juice is collected.

"The liquid is about the consistency of milk, and contains from ten to twenty per cent. of gum. It is poured into shallow basins, very often into empty turtle-shells, and allowed to stand in the sun, by which a good deal of the liquid is evaporated. When it is about the thickness of ordinary cream it is poured into a turtle-shell, and an Indian sits down to convert the liquid into rubber.

"He has a small fire made of palm nuts, and over the fire is an inverted jar with a hole in the bottom, through which the smoke ascends. He dips a paddle into the cream, and then holds it over the hole in the jar until it is dried by the heat, which must always be gentle, through fear of spoiling the rubber. When the gum is hardened he dips the paddle again, and again dries it; he repeats the process until the desired thickness is secured.

"When the rubber is thick enough it is cut off and is ready for market. Instead of a paddle he sometimes uses a mould of clay; formerly they made moulds resembling the human foot, and thus fashioned the rubber shoes that were worn in America forty or fifty years ago. Fantastic figures were traced on the shoes with the end of a hot wire, and the mould was generally soaked in water till it fell to pieces, and the clay could be washed out. The modern processes of working rubber have driven these shoes from the market, and very few of them are made at present.

"A good day's work for one man is six pounds of rubber. Another way of hardening the gum is to place it in a kettle and suspend it over a small fire, taking care not to burn the material. When it is sufficiently reduced, and is still warm and plastic, it is shaped into balls or bricks, weighing several pounds each; the buyers prefer to have it dried on the paddle, as the natives occasionally commit frauds by putting sand or lumps of clay inside the masses while shaping them. The deception can only be detected by cutting carefully through the mass, and dividing it into small pieces. Frank suggests that the natives have probably heard of some of the tricks attributed to Connecticut Yankees, but I think he must be mistaken.

"The rubber of the Amazon valley is considered the best in the world, and the amount of the product is rapidly increasing. I am told it is not far from six thousand tons a year, and will be increased to ten thousand tons as soon as the means of transportation from Bolivia are made more practicable. This does not include the rubber sent from the northern part of the continent, from the country not drained by the Amazon.

"We call this substance 'India-rubber,' because it was first brought from the Indies, but, properly speaking, the name does not belong to it at the present day. The greater part of the rubber of commerce is from South America, which produces more than all other countries together."

"And why is it called _rubber_?" Frank asked.

"Because," replied Fred, "it was first used in England for rubbing out pencil-marks. It was imported into England for that purpose about the end of the last century, and was greatly esteemed by artists, who paid high prices for it; it was popularly called 'lead-eater,' and in some parts of England it is yet known by that name. It was not until 1820 that its use extended much beyond the erasure of pencil-marks; its first important use was in the manufacture of water-proof clothing, and about the same time it was employed for the formation of flexible tubes, and for other purposes.

"It is a curious fact that the uses of rubber which have been discovered in England and America in the present century were known in South America nearly three hundred years ago. In a book published in Madrid in 1615, Juan de Torquemada describes a tree in Mexico yielding a gum from which the natives make shoes and other things, and he also says that the Spaniards used this gum for waxing their canvas cloaks to make them resist water. Herrara's account of the second voyage of Columbus mentions balls which the natives of Hayti use in their amusements; he says they are made from the gum of a tree, and are lighter and bounce better than the wind-balls of Castile."

When the above notes were read over to the Doctor he suggested an addition, which was made at once.

"By far the most extensive uses of this material at present are in its vulcanized form, as the pure India-rubber can only be employed to a limited extent. The process of vulcanizing was discovered by an American, Charles Goodyear, in 1843, and consists in mixing rubber with sulphur and heating it to a high degree. There are two kinds of vulcanized rubber, one hard and horny, and the other soft and elastic; for the first the rubber is cut into small shreds, mixed with a third of its weight of sulphur, and heated for several hours, the final heat being not less than 300 deg. Fahrenheit. For the elastic rubber the proportion of sulphur and the degree of heat are much less. An endless variety of articles is made from the two kinds of vulcanized rubber."

"While we are on this subject," said Frank, "I wonder if there is a cow-tree in this region. The cow-tree is a South American production, is it not?"

"Yes," answered the Doctor, "but it is not in this part of the continent, or, at any rate, the most famous of the family does not grow in the lowlands. There are several trees known by that name, but the _Palo do Vaca_ is found principally in Venezuela and the northern part of the continent, generally at an elevation of three or four thousand feet."

"Please tell us what it is like."

"It is a tall, slender tree, with leaves resembling the laurel in shape, but ten or twelve inches long. It grows in rocky places where there is very little moisture, and during the dry season its leaves are withered and the branches appear dead. But as soon as the trunk is pierced it gives forth a rich, nourishing juice that resembles milk in appearance, taste, and qualities, though it differs materially from the milk of animals. It contains a good deal of wax and fibrin, a little sugar and a salt of magnesia, the rest being water."

"And does it make cream like the milk of a living cow?"

"Yes; after standing a short time it becomes yellow and forms a sort of cream on the surface; this cream will gradually thicken into a semblance of cheese before it begins to putrefy. And the tree further resembles the cow in having its best milking-time in the morning; it yields more juice at sunrise than at any other time, and before daylight the natives gather at the trees to fill their bowls with the milk. The negroes and Indians drink freely of this milk, but the white inhabitants generally care little for it."

Frank fell to meditating upon the feasibility of introducing the cow-tree into his father's orchard, and having a supply of milk where it did not need to be driven up at night. His calculations were suddenly interrupted by the announcement that dinner was ready, and his practical nature, backed by a good appetite, put an immediate end to his enterprise.