第113章
The forest was not crowded with underwood, and pathways led through it for many miles and in various directions.I could make no use here of our two men as hunters, so, to keep them employed while Jose and I worked daily in the woods, I set them to make a montaria under John Aracu's directions.The first day a suitable tree was found for the shell of the boat, of the kind called Itauba amarello, the yellow variety of the stonewood.They felled it, and shaped out of the trunk a log nineteen feet in length;this they dragged from the forest, with the help of my host's men, over a road they had previously made with cylindrical pieces of wood acting as rollers.The distance was about half a mile, and the ropes used for drawing the heavy load were tough lianas cut from the surrounding trees.This part of the work occupied about a week: the log had then to be hollowed out, which was done with strong chisels through a slit made down the whole length.
The heavy portion of the task being then completed, nothing remained but to widen the opening, fit two planks for the sides and the same number of semicircular boards for the ends, make the benches, and caulk the seams.
The expanding of the log thus hollowed out is a critical operation, and not always successful, many a good shell being spoiled from splitting or expanding irregularly.It is first reared on tressels, with the slit downwards, over a large fire, which is kept up for seven or eight hours, the process requiringunremitting attention to avoid cracks and make the plank bend with the proper dip at the two ends.Wooden straddlers, made by cleaving pieces of tough elastic wood and fixing them with wedges, are inserted into the opening, their compass being altered gradually as the work goes on, but in different degrees according to the part of the boat operated upon.Our casca turned out a good one-- it took a long time to cool, and was kept in shape whilst it did so by means of wooden cross-pieces.When the boat was finished, it was launched with great merriment by the men, who hoisted coloured handkerchiefs for flags, and paddled it up and down the stream to try its capabilities.My people had suffered as much inconvenience from the want of a montaria as myself, so this was a day of rejoicing to all of us.
I was very successful at this place with regard to the objects of my journey.About twenty new species of fishes and a considerable number of small reptiles were added to my collection; but very few birds were met with worth preserving.A great number of the most conspicuous insects of the locality were new to me, and turned out to be species peculiar to this part of the Amazons valley.The most interesting acquisition was a large and handsome monkey, of a species I had not before met with--the, white-whiskered Coaita, or spider-monkey (Ateles marginatus).I saw a pair one day in the forest moving slowly along the branches of a lofty tree, and shot one of them; the next day John Aracu brought down another, possibly the companion.The species is of about the same size as the common black kind, of which I have given an account in a former chapter, and has a similar lean body, with limbs clothed with coarse black hair; but it differs in having the whiskers and a triangular patch on the crown of the head of a white colour.I thought the meat the best flavoured I had ever tasted.It resembled beef, but had a richer and sweeter taste.
During the time of our stay in this part of the Cupari, we could get scarcely anything but fish to eat, and as this diet disagreed with me, three successive days of it reducing me to a state of great weakness.I was obliged to make the most of our Coaita meat.We smoke-dried the joints instead of salting them, placing them for several hours upon a framework of sticks arranged over a fire, a plan adopted by the natives to preserve fish when they have no salt, and which they call "muquiar." Meat putrefies in this climate in less than twenty-four hours, and salting is of no use, unless the pieces are cut in thin slices anddried immediately in the sun.
My monkeys lasted me about: a fortnight, the last joint being an arm with the clenched fist, which I used with great economy, hanging it in the intervals, between my frugal meals, on a nail in the cabin.Nothing but the hardest necessity could have driven me so near to cannibalism as this, but we had the greatest difficulty in obtaining here a sufficient supply of animal food.
About every three days the work on the montaria had to be suspended, and all hands turned out for the day to hunt and fish, in which they were often unsuccessful, for although there was plenty of game in the forest, it was too widely scattered to be available.Ricardo, and Alberto occasionally brought in a tortoise or anteater, which served us for one day's consumption.
We made acquaintance here with many strange dishes, amongst them Iguana eggs; these are of oblong form, about an inch in length, and covered with a flexible shell.The lizard lays about two score of them in the hollows of trees.They have an oily taste;the men ate them raw, beaten up with farinha, mixing a pinch of salt in the mess; I could only do with them when mixed with Tucupi sauce, of which we had a large jar full always ready to temper unsavoury morsels.