Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon by Jules Verne

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Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon

by Jules Verne

CONTENTS

PART 1. THE GIANT RAFT

CHAPTER I. A CAPTAIN OF THE WOODS
CHAPTER II. ROBBER AND ROBBED
CHAPTER III. THE GARRAL FAMILY
CHAPTER IV. HESITATION
CHAPTER V. THE AMAZON
CHAPTER VI. A FOREST ON THE GROUND
CHAPTER VII. FOLLOWING A LIANA
CHAPTER VIII. THE JANGADA
CHAPTER IX. THE EVENING OF THE FIFTH OF JUNE
CHAPTER X. FROM IQUITOS TO PEVAS
CHAPTER XI. FROM PEVAS TO THE FRONTIER
CHAPTER XII. FRAGOSO AT WORK
CHAPTER XIII. TORRES
CHAPTER XIV. STILL DESCENDING
CHAPTER XV. THE CONTINUED DESCENT
CHAPTER XVI. EGA
CHAPTER XVII. AN ATTACK
CHAPTER XVIII. THE ARRIVAL DINNER
CHAPTER XIX. ANCIENT HISTORY
CHAPTER XX. BETWEEN THE TWO MEN

PART II. THE CRYPTOGRAM

CHAPTER I. MANAOS
CHAPTER II. THE FIRST MOMENTS
CHAPTER III. RETROSPECTIVE
CHAPTER IV. MORAL PROOFS
CHAPTER V. MATERIAL PROOFS
CHAPTER VI. THE LAST BLOW
CHAPTER VII. RESOLUTIONS
CHAPTER VIII. THE FIRST SEARCH
CHAPTER IX. THE SECOND ATTEMPT
CHAPTER X. A CANNON SHOT
CHAPTER XI. THE CONTENTS OF THE CASE
CHAPTER XII. THE DOCUMENT
CHAPTER XIII. IS IT A MATTER OF FIGURES?
CHAPTER XIV. CHANCE!
CHAPTER XV. THE LAST EFFORTS
CHAPTER XVI. PREPARATIONS
CHAPTER XVII. THE LAST NIGHT
CHAPTER XVIII. FRAGOSO
CHAPTER XIX. THE CRIME OF TIJUCO
CHAPTER XX. THE LOWER AMAZON

PART I

THE GIANT RAFT

CHAPTER I

A CAPTAIN OF THE WOODS

_"P h y j s l y d d q f d z x g a s g z z q q e h x g k f n d r x u j
u g I o c y t d x v k s b x h h u y p o h d v y r y m h u h p u y d k
j o x p h e t o z l s l e t n p m v f f o v p d p a j x h y y n o j y
g g a y m e q y n f u q l n m v l y f g s u z m q I z t l b q q y u g
s q e u b v n r c r e d g r u z b l r m x y u h q h p z d r r g c r o
h e p q x u f I v v r p l p h o n t h v d d q f h q s n t z h h h n f
e p m q k y u u e x k t o g z g k y u u m f v I j d q d p z j q s y k
r p l x h x q r y m v k l o h h h o t o z v d k s p p s u v j h d."_

THE MAN who held in his hand the document of which this strange
assemblage of letters formed the concluding paragraph remained for
some moments lost in thought.

It contained about a hundred of these lines, with the letters at even
distances, and undivided into words. It seemed to have been written
many years before, and time had already laid his tawny finger on the
sheet of good stout paper which was covered with the hieroglyphics.

On what principle had these letters been arranged? He who held the
paper was alone able to tell. With such cipher language it is as with
the locks of some of our iron safes--in either case the protection is
the same. The combinations which they lead to can be counted by
millions, and no calculator's life would suffice to express them.
Some particular "word" has to be known before the lock of the safe
will act, and some "cipher" is necessary before that cryptogram can
be read.

He who had just reperused the document was but a simple "captain of
the woods." Under the name of _"Capitaes do Mato"_ are known in
Brazil those individuals who are engaged in the recapture of fugitive
slaves. The institution dates from 1722. At that period anti-slavery
ideas had entered the minds of a few philanthropists, and more than a
century had to elapse before the mass of the people grasped and
applied them. That freedom was a right, that the very first of the
natural rights of man was to be free and to belong only to himself,
would seem to be self-evident, and yet thousands of years had to pass
before the glorious thought was generally accepted, and the nations
of the earth had the courage to proclaim it.

In 1852, the year in which our story opens, there were still slaves
in Brazil, and as a natural consequence, captains of the woods to
pursue them. For certain reasons of political economy the hour of
general emancipation had been delayed, but the black had at this date
the right to ransom himself, the children which were born to him were
born free. The day was not far distant when the magnificent country,
into which could be put three-quarters of the continent of Europe,
would no longer count a single slave among its ten millions of
inhabitants.

The occupation of the captains of the woods was doomed, and at the
period we speak of the advantages obtainable from the capture of
fugitives were rapidly diminishing. While, however, the calling
continued sufficiently profitable, the captains of the woods formed a
peculiar class of adventurers, principally composed of freedmen and
deserters--of not very enviable reputation. The slave hunters in fact
belonged to the dregs of society, and we shall not be far wrong in
assuming that the man with the cryptogram was a fitting comrade for
his fellow _"capitaes do mato."_ Torres--for that was his
name--unlike the majority of his companions, was neither half-breed,
Indian, nor negro. He was a white of Brazilian origin, and had
received a better education than befitted his present condition. One
of those unclassed men who are found so frequently in the distant
countries of the New World, at a time when the Brazilian law still
excluded mulattoes and others of mixed blood from certain
employments, it was evident that if such exclusion had affected him,
it had done so on account of his worthless character, and not because
of his birth.

Torres at the present moment was not, however, in Brazil. He had just
passed the frontier, and was wandering in the forests of Peru, from
which issue the waters of the Upper Amazon.

He was a man of about thirty years of age, on whom the fatigues of a
precarious existence seemed, thanks to an exceptional temperament and
an iron constitution, to have had no effect. Of middle height, broad
shoulders, regular features, and decided gait, his face was tanned
with the scorching air of the tropics. He had a thick black beard,
and eyes lost under contracting eyebrows, giving that swift but hard
glance so characteristic of insolent natures. Clothed as backwoodsmen
are generally clothed, not over elaborately, his garments bore
witness to long and roughish wear. On his head, stuck jauntily on one
side, was a leather hat with a large brim. Trousers he had of coarse
wool, which were tucked into the tops of the thick, heavy boots which
formed the most substantial part of his attire, and over all, and
hiding all, was a faded yellowish poncho.

But if Torres was a captain of the woods it was evident that he was
not now employed in that capacity, his means of attack and defense
being obviously insufficient for any one engaged in the pursuit of
the blacks. No firearms--neither gun nor revolver. In his belt only
one of those weapons, more sword than hunting-knife, called a
_"manchetta,"_ and in addition he had an _"enchada,"_ which is a sort
of hoe, specially employed in the pursuit of the tatous and agoutis
which abound in the forests of the Upper Amazon, where there is
generally little to fear from wild beasts.

On the 4th of May, 1852, it happened, then, that our adventurer was
deeply absorbed in the reading of the document on which his eyes were
fixed, and, accustomed as he was to live in the forests of South
America, he was perfectly indifferent to their splendors. Nothing
could distract his attention; neither the constant cry of the howling
monkeys, which St. Hillaire has graphically compared to the ax of the
woodman as he strikes the branches of the trees, nor the sharp jingle
of the rings of the rattlesnake (not an aggressive reptile, it is
true, but one of the most venomous); neither the bawling voice of the
horned toad, the most hideous of its kind, nor even the solemn and
sonorous croak of the bellowing frog, which, though it cannot equal
the bull in size, can surpass him in noise.

Torres heard nothing of all these sounds, which form, as it were, the
complex voice of the forests of the New World. Reclining at the foot
of a magnificent tree, he did not even admire the lofty boughs of
that _"pao ferro,"_ or iron wood, with its somber bark, hard as the
metal which it replaces in the weapon and utensil of the Indian
savage. No. Lost in thought, the captain of the woods turned the
curious paper again and again between his fingers. With the cipher,
of which he had the secret, he assigned to each letter its true
value. He read, he verified the sense of those lines, unintelligible
to all but him, and then he smiled--and a most unpleasant smile it
was.

Then he murmured some phrases in an undertone which none in the
solitude of the Peruvian forests could hear, and which no one, had he
been anywhere else, would have heard.

"Yes," said he, at length, "here are a hundred lines very neatly
written, which, for some one that I know, have an importance that is
undoubted. That somebody is rich. It is a question of life or death
for him, and looked at in every way it will cost him something." And,
scrutinizing the paper with greedy eyes, "At a conto [1] only for
each word of this last sentence it will amount to a considerable sum,
and it is this sentence which fixes the price. It sums up the entire
document. It gives their true names to true personages; but before
trying to understand it I ought to begin by counting the number of
words it contains, and even when this is done its true meaning may be
missed."

In saying this Torres began to count mentally.

"There are fifty-eight words, and that makes fifty-eight contos. With
nothing but that one could live in Brazil, in America, wherever one
wished, and even live without doing anything! And what would it be,
then, if all the words of this document were paid for at the same
price? It would be necessary to count by hundreds of contos. Ah!
there is quite a fortune here for me to realize if I am not the
greatest of duffers!"

It seemed as though the hands of Torres felt the enormous sum, and
were already closing over the rolls of gold. Suddenly his thoughts
took another turn.

"At length," he cried, "I see land; and I do not regret the voyage
which has led me from the coast of the Atlantic to the Upper Amazon.
But this man may quit America and go beyond the seas, and then how
can I touch him? But no! he is there, and if I climb to the top of
this tree I can see the roof under which he lives with his family!"
Then seizing the paper and shaking it with terrible meaning: "Before
to-morrow I will be in his presence; before to-morrow he will know
that his honor and his life are contained in these lines. And when he
wishes to see the cipher which permits him to read them, he--well, he
will pay for it. He will pay, if I wish it, with all his fortune, as
he ought to pay with all his blood! Ah! My worthy comrade, who gave
me this cipher, who told me where I could find his old colleague, and
the name under which he has been hiding himself for so many years,
hardly suspects that he has made my fortune!"

For the last time Torres glanced over the yellow paper, and then,
after carefully folding it, put it away into a little copper box
which he used for a purse. This box was about as big as a cigar case,
and if what was in it was all Torres possessed he would nowhere have
been considered a wealthy man. He had a few of all the coins of the
neighboring States--ten double-condors in gold of the United States
of Colombia, worth about a hundred francs; Brazilian reis, worth
about as much; golden sols of Peru, worth, say, double; some Chilian
escudos, worth fifty francs or more, and some smaller coins; but the
lot would not amount to more than five hundred francs, and Torres
would have been somewhat embarrassed had he been asked how or where
he had got them. One thing was certain, that for some months, after
having suddenly abandoned the trade of the slave hunter, which he
carried on in the province of Para, Torres had ascended the basin of
the Amazon, crossed the Brazilian frontier, and come into Peruvian
territory. To such a man the necessaries of life were but few;
expenses he had none--nothing for his lodging, nothing for his
clothes. The forest provided his food, which in the backwoods cost
him naught. A few reis were enough for his tobacco, which he bought
at the mission stations or in the villages, and for a trifle more he
filled his flask with liquor. With little he could go far.

When he had pushed the paper into the metal box, of which the lid
shut tightly with a snap, Torres, instead of putting it into the
pocket of his under-vest, thought to be extra careful, and placed it
near him in a hollow of a root of the tree beneath which he was
sitting. This proceeding, as it turned out, might have cost him dear.

It was very warm; the air was oppressive. If the church of the
nearest village had possessed a clock, the clock would have struck
two, and, coming with the wind, Torres would have heard it, for it
was not more than a couple of miles off. But he cared not as to time.
Accustomed to regulate his proceedings by the height of the sun,
calculated with more or less accuracy, he could scarcely be supposed
to conduct himself with military precision. He breakfasted or dined
when he pleased or when he could; he slept when and where sleep
overtook him. If his table was not always spread, his bed was always
ready at the foot of some tree in the open forest. And in other
respects Torres was not difficult to please. He had traveled during
most of the morning, and having already eaten a little, he began to
feel the want of a snooze. Two or three hours' rest would, he
thought, put him in a state to continue his road, and so he laid
himself down on the grass as comfortably as he could, and waited for
sleep beneath the ironwood-tree.

Torres was not one of those people who drop off to sleep without
certain preliminaries. HE was in the habit of drinking a drop or two
of strong liquor, and of then smoking a pipe; the spirits, he said,
overexcited the brain, and the tobacco smoke agreeably mingled with
the general haziness of his reverie.

Torres commenced, then, by applying to his lips a flask which he
carried at his side; it contained the liquor generally known under
the name of _"chica"_ in Peru, and more particularly under that of
_"caysuma"_ in the Upper Amazon, to which fermented distillation of
the root of the sweet manioc the captain had added a good dose of
_"tafia"_ or native rum.

When Torres had drunk a little of this mixture he shook the flask,
and discovered, not without regret, that it was nearly empty.

"Must get some more," he said very quietly.

Then taking out a short wooden pipe, he filled it with the coarse and
bitter tobacco of Brazil, of which the leaves belong to that old
_"petun"_ introduced into France by Nicot, to whom we owe the
popularization of the most productive and widespread of the
solanaceae.

This native tobacco had little in common with the fine qualities of
our present manufacturers; but Torres was not more difficult to
please in this matter than in others, and so, having filled his pipe,
he struck a match and applied the flame to a piece of that stick
substance which is the secretion of certain of the hymenoptera, and
is known as "ants' amadou." With the amadou he lighted up, and after
about a dozen whiffs his eyes closed, his pipe escaped from his
fingers, and he fell asleep.

[1] One thousand reis are equal to three francs, and a conto of reis
is worth three thousand francs.

CHAPTER II

ROBBER AND ROBBED

TORRES SLEPT for about half an hour, and then there was a noise among
the trees--a sound of light footsteps, as though some visitor was
walking with naked feet, and taking all the precaution he could lest
he should be heard. To have put himself on guard against any
suspicious approach would have been the first care of our adventurer
had his eyes been open at the time. But he had not then awoke, and
what advanced was able to arrive in his presence, at ten paces from
the tree, without being perceived.

It was not a man at all, it was a "guariba."

Of all the prehensile-tailed monkeys which haunt the forests of the
Upper Amazon--graceful sahuis, horned sapajous, gray-coated monos,
sagouins which seem to wear a mask on their grimacing faces--the
guariba is without doubt the most eccentric. Of sociable disposition,
and not very savage, differing therein very greatly from the mucura,
who is as ferocious as he is foul, he delights in company, and
generally travels in troops. It was he whose presence had been
signaled from afar by the monotonous concert of voices, so like the
psalm-singing of some church choir. But if nature has not made him
vicious, it is none the less necessary to attack him with caution,
and under any circumstances a sleeping traveler ought not to leave
himself exposed, lest a guariba should surprise him when he is not in
a position to defend himself.

This monkey, which is also known in Brazil as the "barbado," was of
large size. The suppleness and stoutness of his limbs proclaimed him
a powerful creature, as fit to fight on the ground as to leap from
branch to branch at the tops of the giants of the forest.

He advanced then cautiously, and with short steps. He glanced to the
right and to the left, and rapidly swung his tail. To these
representatives of the monkey tribe nature has not been content to
give four hands--she has shown herself more generous, and added a
fifth, for the extremity of their caudal appendage possesses a
perfect power of prehension.

The guariba noiselessly approached, brandishing a study cudgel,
which, wielded by his muscular arm, would have proved a formidable
weapon. For some minutes he had seen the man at the foot of the tree,
but the sleeper did not move, and this doubtless induced him to come
and look at him a little nearer. He came forward then, not without
hesitation, and stopped at last about three paces off.

On his bearded face was pictured a grin, which showed his sharp-edged
teeth, white as ivory, and the cudgel began to move about in a way
that was not very reassuring for the captain of the woods.

Unmistakably the sight of Torres did not inspire the guariba with
friendly thoughts. Had he then particular reasons for wishing evil to
this defenseless specimen of the human race which chance had
delivered over to him? Perhaps! We know how certain animals retain
the memory of the bad treatment they have received, and it is
possible that against backwoodsmen in general he bore some special
grudge.

In fact Indians especially make more fuss about the monkey than any
other kind of game, and, no matter to what species it belongs, follow
its chase with the ardor of Nimrods, not only for the pleasure of
hunting it, but for the pleasure of eating it.

Whatever it was, the guariba did not seen disinclined to change
characters this time, and if he did not quite forget that nature had
made him but a simple herbivore, and longed to devour the captain of
the woods, he seemed at least to have made up his mind to get rid of
one of his natural enemies.

After looking at him for some minutes the guariba began to move round
the tree. He stepped slowly, holding his breath, and getting nearer
and nearer. His attitude was threatening, his countenance ferocious.
Nothing could have seemed easier to him than to have crushed this
motionless man at a single blow, and assuredly at that moment the
life of Torres hung by a thread.

In truth, the guariba stopped a second time close up to the tree,
placed himself at the side, so as to command the head of the sleeper,
and lifted his stick to give the blow.

But if Torres had been imprudent in putting near him in the crevice
of the root the little case which contained his document and his
fortune, it was this imprudence which saved his life.

A sunbeam shooting between the branches just glinted on the case, the
polished metal of which lighted up like a looking-glass. The monkey,
with the frivolity peculiar to his species, instantly had his
attention distracted. His ideas, if such an animal could have ideas,
took another direction. He stopped, caught hold of the case, jumped
back a pace or two, and, raising it to the level of his eyes, looked
at it not without surprise as he moved it about and used it like a
mirror. He was if anything still more astonished when he heard the
rattle of the gold pieces it contained. The music enchanted him. It
was like a rattle in the hands of a child. He carried it to his
mouth, and his teeth grated against the metal, but made no impression
on it.

Doubtless the guariba thought he had found some fruit of a new kind,
a sort of huge almost brilliant all over, and with a kernel playing
freely in its shell. But if he soon discovered his mistake he did not
consider it a reason for throwing the case away; on the contrary, he
grasped it more tightly in his left hand, and dropped the cudgel,
which broke off a dry twig in its fall.

At this noise Torres woke, and with the quickness of those who are
always on the watch, with whom there is no transition from the
sleeping to the waking state, was immediately on his legs.

In an instant Torres had recognized with whom he had to deal.

"A guariba!" he cried.

And his hand seizing his manchetta, he put himself into a posture of
defense.

The monkey, alarmed, jumped back at once, and not so brave before a
waking man as a sleeping one, performed a rapid caper, and glided
under the trees.

"It was time!" said Torres; "the rogue would have settled me without
any ceremony!"

Of a sudden, between the hands of the monkey, who had stopped at
about twenty paces, and was watching him with violent grimaces, as if
he would like to snap his fingers at him, he caught sight of his
precious case.

"The beggar!" he said. "If he has not killed me, he has done what is
almost as bad. He has robbed me!"

The thought that the case held his money was not however, what then
concerned him. But that which made him jump was the recollection that
it contained the precious document, the loss of which was
irreparable, as it carried with it that of all his hopes.

"Botheration!" said he.

And at the moment, cost what it might to recapture his case, Torres
threw himself in pursuit of the guariba.

He knew that to reach such an active animal was not easy. On the
ground he could get away too fast, in the branches he could get away
too far. A well-aimed gunshot could alone stop him as he ran or
climbed, but Torres possessed no firearm. His sword-knife and hoe
were useless unless he could get near enough to hit him.

It soon became evident that the monkey could not be reached unless by
surprise. Hence Torres found it necessary to employ cunning in
dealing with the mischievous animal. To stop, to hide himself behind
some tree trunk, to disappear under a bush, might induce the guariba
to pull up and retrace his steps, and there was nothing else for
Torres to try. This was what he did, and the pursuit commenced under
these conditions; but when the captain of the woods disappeared, the
monkey patiently waited until he came into sight again, and at this
game Torres fatigued himself without result.

"Confound the guariba!" he shouted at length. "There will be no end
to this, and he will lead me back to the Brazilian frontier. If only
he would let go of my case! But no! The jingling of the money amuses
him. Oh, you thief! If I could only get hold of you!"

And Torres recommenced the pursuit, and the monkey scuttled off with
renewed vigor.

An hour passed in this way without any result. Torres showed a
persistency which was quite natural. How without this document could
he get his money?

And then anger seized him. He swore, he stamped, he threatened the
guariba. That annoying animal only responded by a chuckling which was
enough to put him beside himself.

And then Torres gave himself up to the chase. He ran at top speed,
entangling himself in the high undergrowth, among those thick
brambles and interlacing creepers, across which the guariba passed
like a steeplechaser. Big roots hidden beneath the grass lay often in
the way. He stumbled over them and again started in pursuit. At
length, to his astonishment, he found himself shouting:

"Come here! come here! you robber!" as if he could make him
understand him.

His strength gave out, breath failed him, and he was obliged to stop.
"Confound it!" said he, "when I am after runaway slaves across the
jungle they never give me such trouble as this! But I will have you,
you wretched monkey! I will go, yes, I will go as far as my legs will
carry me, and we shall see!"

The guariba had remained motionless when he saw that the adventurer
had ceased to pursue him. He rested also, for he had nearly reached
that degree of exhaustion which had forbidden all movement on the
part of Torres.

He remained like this during ten minutes, nibbling away at two or
three roots, which he picked off the ground, and from time to time he
rattled the case at his ear.

Torres, driven to distraction, picked up the stones within his reach,
and threw them at him, but did no harm at such a distance.

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