Rio Negro

“ Many of the worst characters in the Rio Negro come to trade in this river, force the Indians, by threats of shooting them, into their canoes, and sometimes even do not scruple to carry their threats into execution, they being here quite out of reach of even that minute portion of the law which still struggles for existence in the Rio Negro. ”

“ Rio Negro, first of the divisions of Argentina to stretch across the country, has Neuquen and La Pampa on the north, Buenos Aires and the Atlantic east, Chubut south, and Chile and Neuquen west. The section between the Negro and Colorado Rivers is fertile, also patches near other streams; wherever irrigated, good crops of wheat, corn, oats, and alfalfa are certain. Fruits and vines do well in the Negro Valley. Excellent timber is exported in beams and planks. There are some towns and many agricultural colonies; trade goes on with Chile in cattle and sheep. ”

“ The city of Barra do Rio Negro is situated on the east bank of that river, about twelve miles above its junction with the Amazon. It is on uneven ground, about thirty feet above the high-water level, and there are two small streams or gullies running through it, where during the wet season the water rises to a considerable height, and across which are two wooden bridges. The streets are regularly laid out, but quite unpaved, much undulating, and full of holes, so that walking about at night is very unpleasant. ”

“ To navigate the Rio Negro, as Rojas and others imagine can be done, from the llanos to Caquesa—thirty-seven hundred feet higher than the plains—would be no more possible than it would be to row or sail up an Alpine torrent. From Caquesa to Bogotá is not four leagues, as Michelena estimates, but full twenty-five miles. ”

“ This thirteen square leagues of fertile loam soil between two branches of the Rio Negro is one of the most prosperous communities in southern Argentine, with half a dozen villages, roads sometimes passable even in the wet season, and noted for the variety of immigration with which it has been peopled. ”

“ When I was at the Barra do Rio Negro in 1851, a man of colour, named Serafim Salgado, arrived there from the Purús, where he had spent some six months, trading with the Purupurú (or Spotted) Indians, who inhabit the lower part of the river, and from whom it takes its name ”

“ In the Argentine known loafers are invited in. Men are found there who own horses and ride about from ranch to ranch, never doing a stroke of work from one year to another, and yet are made welcome at a single ranch table for weeks and months at a stretch. I have never heard of such a custom elsewhere, except in Australia. These pampa vagabonds have extended their routes to the Rio Negro ranches since the destruction of the Indians made it possible to settle the Rio Negro valley.
Next came the tramp element to the Welsh colony at Chubut. ”

“ But the idea of the glorious life which might be led here, free from all the money-matter cares and annoyances of civilization, make me sometimes doubt, if it would not be wiser to bid thee adieu for ever, and come and live a life of ease and plenty in the Rio Negro. ”

“ The settlers were naturally anxious to know my opinion as to the probable safety of the Rio Negro, and I assured them that, from what I knew, there was little chance of a raid, but that on the contrary Bahia Blanca was sure to be attacked, and I especially warned one of our countrymen who was on his way to Bahia Blanca not to hazard himself by settling outside the town at the present juncture. Englishmen are apt to suppose that because they possess good weapons, rifles and revolvers, and are able and ready to use them, they can resist an Indian attack ”

“ It is said that the old colonial life, the old-time somnolence, Brazil as she was in the olden days, is still best seen in Bahia. If so, I am glad that my Brazilian journey came at a later date. Compared with the old capital, Rio seems little more than a quadroon city, and few negroes among many whites is plainly better for the negro than to be surrounded on all sides by bad examples of his own race.
The negroes are so numerous and so sluggish in their movements that unless one would be jostled at every turn one can travel the streets only by stepping out of their way. ”

“ On the south side of the Amazon also, between the Madeira and the Uaycáli, and extending to the Andes of Peru and Bolivia, is a still larger tract of unknown virgin forest, uninhabited by a single civilized man: here reside numerous nations of the native American race, known only by the reports of the border tribes, who form the communication between them and the traders of the great rivers.
One of the best-known and most regularly visited rivers of this great tract is the Purús, whose mouth is a short distance above the Rio Negro, but whose sources a three months’ voyage does not reach. ”

“ During our stay in Rio we saw much to interest us. The negro was very much in evidence. Slavery was still the law of the land; all the toil and burden-bearing falls to the poor slave's lot. One day we all three took an early train and alighted at a small hamlet on the border of a stream about thirty miles from Rio, beyond the ranges of mountains that hem in the city. ”

“ From this, strange errors have arisen: we find in some maps the note “Juries, curly-haired Negroes,” whereas they are pure straight-haired Indians. They are good servants for511 canoe and agricultural work, and are the most skilful of all in the use of the gravatána, or blow-pipe.
In the same neighbourhood are Miránhas, who are cannibals; and the Ximánas and Cauxánas, who kill all their first-born children: in fact, between the Upper Amazon, the Guaviare, and the Andes, there is a region as large as England, whose inhabitants are entirely uncivilized and unknown. ”

“ Should we acquire the territory beyond the Rio Grande and east of the Rocky Mountains, it is still more impossible that a majority of the people would consent to reëstablish slavery. They are themselves a colored population, and among them the negro does not belong socially to a degraded race. ”

“ We were struck by the immense number of negroes who crowd the streets. Those born in Africa are known by the distinguishing marks of their tribes on their foreheads. Many of them are free. A negro in Rio may demand his valuation from a magistrate, and when he can make up the fixed sum he can purchase his freedom. Slaves are generally treated kindly by their masters, and as their price is high, on account of the impediments thrown in the way of the slave trade, their health is carefully looked after. The porters are all slaves. ”

“ At the period of our visit, the berries were just beginning to colour, and the branches were bent down with the weight of their produce. The country here consists of low hills, upon which the plantations are formed; these hills had previously been covered with forest. There were about 200 slaves on the estate, 70 of whom only were employed as field-labourers, the others being occupied at various trades, such as cabinet-makers, carpenters, masons, blacksmiths, &c. A few days previous to our arrival, about twenty young negro boys, recently imported, were brought up from Rio ”

“ Lord Bryce says, "It is hardly too much to say that along the coast from Rio to Bahia and Pernambuco, as well as in parts of the interior behind these two cities, the black population predominates.... The Brazilian lower class intermarries freely with the black people ”

“ Lilac and blue mountains ring the valley on both sides, and from them emerald fields of alfalfa, sparkling in the sun, slope down to the old, winding stream. Because its silt is so fertile, one race has succeeded another here—cliff-dwellers, Indian, Spanish, Mexican, and American—and a remnant of each, save the earliest, has clung where living is easy. So we came all along the Rio Grande for a hundred miles to little groups of towns, each allotted to a different race keeping itself to itself, Mexican, American, and Indian.
It was under the deep-blue night sky that we saw our first pueblo town. ”

“ Now we pass through acres of forest banking up each side so high that it is all blackness; while every few miles the mournful tolling of the engine bell heralds us into a wayside village, the lights streaming through the doors of whitewashed huts, and Indians, muffled to their eyes in blankets, standing in silent groups by the railside.
At Rio Blanco we rattle past a great cotton factory, its myriad lights twinkling into such a confusion of illumination that it looks like a swarm of fireflies hovering amid the darkened houses and huts of the town. ”

“ No one could stand on Cape Mesurado, and see the intermingled churches and houses; the broad expanses of interior waters, bordered by residences, and see a people elevated far, very far, to say the least, above those of their color in other parts of the world, without the consciousness that a great work was begun. To meet everywhere the dark-browed men of Africa, solely the governors of it all, indicated a great fact in the history of the negro race. ”

“ Some English settlers, disappointed in the river Plata, went to Rio Grande to establish concerns for curing beef, refining tallow, &c. which they soon abandoned from the want of practical knowledge.
[78] Almost every vessel brings a greater or smaller number of negroes, it being the practice at Rio de Janeiro to ship off all those who are ill-disposed and troublesome for Rio Grande, whence, if they continue refractory, they are frequently sold into the neighbouring colony. ”

“ Yet even here there is a vast difference, especially in the upper courses of the river. Each at its mouth flows through a rich, fertile plain occupied by a progressive, prosperous people. But the Rio de la Plata takes its rise in one of the world's most backward plains, the home of uncivilized Indians, heartless rubber adventurers, and the most rapacious of officials. Not infrequently, the degenerate white men of these regions, yielding to the subtle and insidious influence of the tropics, inflict the most outrageous abuses upon the natives, and even kill them on slight provocation. ”

“ Crossing the boundary from Brazil to Uruguay, one sees a new picture. Uruguay is almost entirely white. Indeed, this whole region of La Plata is one of the future dominant areas of the New World. It contains less Negro blood than does, relatively, the United States. Not only have Negroes been largely kept out, but the remnants of Indian tribes have become inconspicuous, as on the plains of the Mississippi Valley, where the Indians, mere nomads with a negligible culture, were driven back by the march of civilization. ”

“ There are points of view in which this traffic wears a more cheering aspect; for any one comparing the puny Portuguese or the bastard Brazilian with the athletic negro, cannot but allow that the ordinary changes and chances of time will place this fine country in the hands of the latter race. The negro will be fit to cultivate the soil, and will thrive beneath the tropical sun of the Brazils. ”

“ The bustle and activity of the place give a high idea of the commerce of Rio. A multitude of negroes are constantly employed, who labour without intermission the whole day in removing packages of different kinds. ”

“ About ten or twelve leagues to the south of the river of Gesves, is that to which the Portuguese have given the name of Rio Grande, on account of its extent compared with the others which are near it. From this river they derive ivory, wax, gold, and slaves; the quantity or number of which varies according to the wars which the people make among themselves. On ascending this river to the height of eighty leagues or thereabouts from its mouth, you meet with a nation of Negroes called Anabous: they are good merchants, and supply much ivory and rice, as well as some slaves. ”

“ Throughout the entire length of the Nile Valley, until replaced by the Arab far to the north, the dwellers upon either bank are of pure negro blood. The Nilotic negroes, although the several tribes differ much with respect to their customs and habits, are all of one common type: all exceptionally tall, and all coal-black in colour. The males go naked, and the clothing of the women is limited to a scanty apron of grass or hide. ”

“ I have spoken of the crossing of the race in the Argentine, where the black element has been re-absorbed. It is not the same in Brazil, where at every step one comes across the African half-breed amongst the masses. The Portuguese woman and the negro seem to get on well together, as is evidenced by the innumerable young half-breeds to be seen in their serene bronze nudity at the doors of the cabins. It is difficult to estimate the general results of this mixture. The negro has the reputation of being idle, childlike, and kind except in his outbursts of rage. ”

“ The foreigner stays away from the South; so in a large degree does the Northern man. Not withstanding the unsurpassed climate, the rivers and gulf and mountains, the fertile soil, the varied products, the hospitable welcome, the territory occupied by the negro is persistently avoided. By the census of 1880 the proportion of foreign-born in all the former slave States was 3.5 per cent; in the Northern States about twenty per cent; in eight Southern States, where the negroes abound, there was in 1880 only one and a third per cent who were of foreign birth. ”

“ The proportion of black population is much greater in the northeastern states than elsewhere. As one journeys south they become less numerous, until, when you reach the extreme southern states, they are uncommon. In the state of Bahia, those with a negro admixture far outnumbered the whites. This is due not only to the fact that slavery was first introduced there, but also because it was sooner abolished in that state, and fugitive slaves escaping from the coffee plantations fled there, just as they did to our own Northern states. ”