St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1892-07-07
UP THE ORINOCO.

''T Twelve hundred miles from the
mouth of the Orinoco river was as
far as | extended my explorations
towards the sources Of that great
stream" said Ensign Roger Welles,
who has just returned from the
region mentioned, to a writer for the
Star. He is the only white man that
has penetrated those wilds, at all
events since the days of the early
Spaniards.
"The Orinoco is one of the biggest
rivers in the world, as you may see
by glancing at map of South Amer
ca. 1t is dotted all along it's course
with numerous small islands, and it's
upper waters are obstructed by many
cataracts. During my long journey
towards its sources, my canoe has
often been carried overland around
impossible falls. BY the time one
reaches the Rio Meta, which is the
largest tributary of the Orinoco,
navigation is further interfered with
by wild and savage Indians, who
use poisoned arrows, so that traders
who buy and sell goods along the
stream anchor the sailing scows out
in the middle of it at night, keeping
guard with rifles against possible
surprise.
These primitive aborigines dwell
in huts built of palm leaves mostly.
Each family has its little garden
patch, which is chiefly devoted to
raising the root from which cassava
is made. They depend upon this
root almost entirely for food, apart
from what they get by hunting and
fishing. 1t is prepared by gra ting to
begin with. The greater employed
is of the most primitive possible de-
scription, being simply plank with
perforations, small sharp pieces of
flint being inserted in the holes. Be
ing reduced to a sort of meal by rub
bing on this crater, the cassava is
pressed to get the water out Of it,
because the root is as watery as the
potato. Then it is sifted and formed
for cooking into what looks like an
enormous griddlecake two or three
feet in diameter. This cake is baked
on fiat piece of earthenware of cor
responding size.
IAN Indian will go off for a weeks
hunting with no other food than
quantity of cassava prepared in this
fashion. | myself was obliged to
liveu it almost wholly for m onths.
At first l did not find it palatable,
but after awhile l acquired the taste
and became quite fond of it. The
chief trouble was that it was cooked
on the bare ground and always con-
tanned considerable percentage of
dirt. However, one must not be too
particular about ones diet when
travelling in the wilds. THESE saw
ages are quite cleanly, so far as bath
ing is concerned, but their habits of
living otherwise are not such as to
promote the virtue which is next to
goodness.
IN onial methods are extreme
ly simple among these natives.
When a young man and young
woman wish to marry, they go to
housekeeping together, and that is
all there is of it. Often a youth of
one village will WOO and win
maiden of a village hundreds of miles
distant along the river. AS a rule,
they seem to enjoy as uninterrupted
a domestic felicity as civilized cou pies
obtain. The Indians are gradually
iSlii III ~ w al dS tIO SOuICSS
of the Orinoco because of the harsh
and dishonest treatment which they
receive at the hands of the white men
and half-castes of Venezuela They
can never get fair prices for the
cassava which they produce and sell
to the Venezuelans. Cassava is an
important food of the poorer classes
all through Venezuela, being ground
by machines in factories. Among
the curiosities which | obtained from
these savages for exhibition at the
Worlds fair at Chicago are num-
Der of interesting musical instru-
rnents, such as reed flutes and drums
made out of kind of corkwood. I
intended to speak of the remarkable
pattern in which the beadwork of
the loin cloths is always made. This
pattern, as you will observe, is in
geometric form peculiarly Greek, and
the mystery is where these people
got it from. Not least strange is the
fact that the cassava Creators are
always made with the sharp pieces
of flint arranged in precisely the same