Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest Page 4

  CHAPTER II

  It is fortunate that casserie is manufactured by an extremely slow,laborious process, since the women, who are the drink-makers, in thefirst place have to reduce the material (cassava bread) to a pulp bymeans of their own molars, after which it is watered down and put awayin troughs to ferment. Great is the diligence of these willing slaves;but, work how they will, they can only satisfy their lords' love ofa big drink at long intervals. Such a function as that at which I hadassisted is therefore the result of much patient mastication and silentfermentation--the delicate flower of a plant that has been a long timegrowing.

  Having now established myself as one of the family, at the cost of somedisagreeable sensations and a pang or two of self-disgust, I resolvedto let nothing further trouble me at Parahuari, but to live theeasy, careless life of the idle man, joining in hunting and fishingexpeditions when in the mood; at other times enjoying existence in myown way, apart from my fellows, conversing with wild nature in thatsolitary place. Besides Runi, there were, in our little community, twooldish men, his cousins I believe, who had wives and grown-upchildren. Another family consisted of Piake, Runi's nephew, his brotherKua-ko--about whom there will be much to say--and a sister Oalava. Piakehad a wife and two children; Kua-ko was unmarried and about nineteen ortwenty years old; Oalava was the youngest of the three. Last of all,who should perhaps have been first, was Runi's mother, called Cla-cla,probably in imitation of the cry of some bird, for in these latitudes aperson is rarely, perhaps never, called by his or her real name, whichis a secret jealously preserved, even from near relations. I believethat Cla-cla herself was the only living being who knew the name herparents had bestowed on her at birth. She was a very old woman, sparein figure, brown as old sun-baked leather, her face written over withinnumerable wrinkles, and her long coarse hair perfectly white; yet shewas exceedingly active, and seemed to do more work than any other womanin the community; more than that, when the day's toil was over andnothing remained for the others to do, then Cla-cla's night work wouldbegin; and this was to talk all the others, or at all events all themen, to sleep. She was like a self-regulating machine, and punctuallyevery evening, when the door was closed, and the night fire made up, andevery man in his hammock, she would set herself going, telling the mostinterminable stories, until the last listener was fast asleep; laterin the night, if any man woke with a snort or grunt, off she would goagain, taking up the thread of the tale where she had dropped it.

  Old Cla-cla amused me very much, by night and day, and I seldom tired ofwatching her owlish countenance as she sat by the fire, never allowingit to sink low for want of fuel; always studying the pot when it was onto simmer, and at the same time attending to the movements of the othersabout her, ready at a moment's notice to give assistance or to dart outon a stray chicken or refractory child.

  So much did she amuse me, although without intending it, that Ithought it would be only fair, in my turn, to do something for herentertainment. I was engaged one day in shaping a wooden foil with myknife, whistling and singing snatches of old melodies at my work,when all at once I caught sight of the ancient dame looking greatlydelighted, chuckling internally, nodding her head, and keeping timewith her hands. Evidently she was able to appreciate a style of musicsuperior to that of the aboriginals, and forthwith I abandoned my foilsfor the time and set about the manufacture of a guitar, which costme much labour and brought out more ingenuity than I had ever thoughtmyself capable of. To reduce the wood to the right thinness, then tobend and fasten it with wooden pegs and with gums, to add the arm,frets, keys, and finally the catgut strings--those of another kind beingout of the question--kept me busy for some days. When completed it wasa rude instrument, scarcely tunable; nevertheless when I smote thestrings, playing lively music, or accompanied myself in singing, I foundthat it was a great success, and so was as much pleased with my ownperformance as if I had had the most perfect guitar ever made in oldSpain. I also skipped about the floor, strum-strumming at the same time,instructing them in the most lively dances of the whites, in which thefeet must be as nimble as the player's fingers. It is true that theseexhibitions were always witnessed by the adults with a profound gravity,which would have disheartened a stranger to their ways. They were a setof hollow bronze statues that looked at me, but I knew that the livinganimals inside of them were tickled at my singing, strumming, andpirouetting. Cla-cla was, however, an exception, and encouraged me notinfrequently by emitting a sound, half cackle and half screech, byway of laughter; for she had come to her second childhood, or, at allevents, had dropped the stolid mask which the young Guayana savage, inimitation of his elders, adjusts to his face at about the age of twelve,to wear it thereafter all his life long, or only to drop it occasionallywhen very drunk. The youngsters also openly manifested their pleasure,although, as a rule, they try to restrain their feelings in the presenceof grown-up people, and with them I became a great favourite.

  By and by I returned to my foil-making, and gave them fencing lessons,and sometimes invited two or three of the biggest boys to attack mesimultaneously, just to show how easily I could disarm and kill them.This practice excited some interest in Kua-ko, who had a little more ofcuriosity and geniality and less of the put-on dignity of the others,and with him I became most intimate. Fencing with Kua-ko was highlyamusing: no sooner was he in position, foil in hand, than all myinstructions were thrown to the winds, and he would charge and attack mein his own barbarous manner, with the result that I would send his foilspinning a dozen yards away, while he, struck motionless, would gazeafter it in open-mouthed astonishment.

  Three weeks had passed by not unpleasantly when, one morning, I tookit into my head to walk by myself across that somewhat sterile savannahwest of the village and stream, which ended, as I have said, in a long,low, stony ridge. From the village there was nothing to attract theeye in that direction but I wished to get a better view of that greatsolitary hill or mountain of Ytaioa, and of the cloud-like summitsbeyond it in the distance. From the stream the ground rose in a gradualslope, and the highest part of the ridge for which I made was abouttwo miles from the starting-point--a parched brown plain, with nothinggrowing on it but scattered tussocks of sere hair-like grass.

  When I reached the top and could see the country beyond, I was agreeablydisappointed at the discovery that the sterile ground extended onlyabout a mile and a quarter on the further side, and was succeeded by aforest--a very inviting patch of woodland covering five or six squaremiles, occupying a kind of oblong basin, extending from the foot ofYtaioa on the north to a low range of rocky hills on the south. From thewooded basin long narrow strips of forest ran out in various directionslike the arms of an octopus, one pair embracing the slopes of Ytaioa,another much broader belt extending along a valley which cut through theridge of hills on the south side at right angles and was lost to sightbeyond; far away in the west and south and north distant mountainsappeared, not in regular ranges, but in groups or singly, or lookinglike blue banked-up clouds on the horizon.

  Glad at having discovered the existence of this forest so near home, andwondering why my Indian friends had never taken me to it nor ever wentout on that side, I set forth with a light heart to explore it formyself, regretting only that I was without a proper weapon for procuringgame. The walk from the ridge over the savannah was easy, as the barren,stony ground sloped downwards the whole way. The outer part of the woodon my side was very open, composed in most part of dwarf trees that growon stony soil, and scattered thorny bushes bearing a yellow pea-shapedblossom. Presently I came to thicker wood, where the trees were muchtaller and in greater variety; and after this came another sterilestrip, like that on the edge of the wood where stone cropped out fromthe ground and nothing grew except the yellow-flowered thorn bushes.Passing this sterile ribbon, which seemed to extend to a considerabledistance north and south, and was fifty to a hundred yards wide, theforest again became dense and the trees large, with much undergrowth inplaces obstructing the view and making progress difficult.
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br />   I spent several hours in this wild paradise, which was so much moredelightful than the extensive gloomier forests I had so often penetratedin Guayana; for here, if the trees did not attain to such majesticproportions, the variety of vegetable forms was even greater; as faras I went it was nowhere dark under the trees, and the number of lovelyparasites everywhere illustrated the kindly influence of light and air.Even where the trees were largest the sunshine penetrated, subdued bythe foliage to exquisite greenish-golden tints, filling the wide lowerspaces with tender half-lights, and faint blue-and-gray shadows. Lyingon my back and gazing up, I felt reluctant to rise and renew my ramble.For what a roof was that above my head! Roof I call it, just as thepoets in their poverty sometimes describe the infinite ethereal sky bythat word; but it was no more roof-like and hindering to the soaringspirit than the higher clouds that float in changing forms and tints,and like the foliage chasten the intolerable noonday beams. How farabove me seemed that leafy cloudland into which I gazed! Nature, weknow, first taught the architect to produce by long colonnades theillusion of distance; but the light-excluding roof prevents him fromgetting the same effect above. Here Nature is unapproachable with hergreen, airy canopy, a sun-impregnated cloud--cloud above cloud; andthough the highest may be unreached by the eye, the beams yet filterthrough, illuming the wide spaces beneath--chamber succeeded by chamber,each with its own special lights and shadows. Far above me, but notnearly so far as it seemed, the tender gloom of one such chamber orspace is traversed now by a golden shaft of light falling through somebreak in the upper foliage, giving a strange glory to everything ittouches--projecting leaves, and beard-like tuft of moss, and snakybush-rope. And in the most open part of that most open space, suspendedon nothing to the eye, the shaft reveals a tangle of shining silverthreads--the web of some large tree-spider. These seemingly distant yetdistinctly visible threads serve to remind me that the human artist isonly able to get his horizontal distance by a monotonous reduplicationof pillar and arch, placed at regular intervals, and that the leastdeparture from this order would destroy the effect. But Nature producesher effects at random, and seems only to increase the beautiful illusionby that infinite variety of decoration in which she revels, binding treeto tree in a tangle of anaconda-like lianas, and dwindling down fromthese huge cables to airy webs and hair-like fibres that vibrate to thewind of the passing insect's wing.

  Thus in idleness, with such thoughts for company, I spent my time, gladthat no human being, savage or civilized, was with me. It was better tobe alone to listen to the monkeys that chattered without offending; towatch them occupied with the unserious business of their lives. Withthat luxuriant tropical nature, its green clouds and illusive aerialspaces, full of mystery, they harmonized well in language, appearance,and motions--mountebank angels, living their fantastic lives far aboveearth in a half-way heaven of their own.

  I saw more monkeys on that morning than I usually saw in the course ofa week's rambling. And other animals were seen; I particularly remembertwo accouries I startled, that after rushing away a few yards stoppedand stood peering back at me as if not knowing whether to regard me asfriend or enemy. Birds, too, were strangely abundant; and altogetherthis struck me as being the richest hunting-ground I had seen, and itastonished me to think that the Indians of the village did not appear tovisit it.

  On my return in the afternoon I gave an enthusiastic account of my day'sramble, speaking not of the things that had moved my soul, but only ofthose which move the Guayana Indian's soul--the animal food he craves,and which, one would imagine, Nature would prefer him to do without, sohard he finds it to wrest a sufficiency from her. To my surprise theyshook their heads and looked troubled at what I said; and finally myhost informed me that the wood I had been in was a dangerous place; thatif they went there to hunt, a great injury would be done to them; and hefinished by advising me not to visit it again.

  I began to understand from their looks and the old man's vague wordsthat their fear of the wood was superstitious. If dangerous creatureshad existed there--tigers, or camoodis, or solitary murderoussavages--they would have said so; but when I pressed them with questionsthey could only repeat that "something bad" existed in the place, thatanimals were abundant there because no Indian who valued his life daredventure into it. I replied that unless they gave me some more definiteinformation I should certainly go again and put myself in the way of thedanger they feared.

  My reckless courage, as they considered it, surprised them; but they hadalready begun to find out that their superstitions had no effect on me,that I listened to them as to stories invented to amuse a child, and forthe moment they made no further attempt to dissuade me.

  Next day I returned to the forest of evil report, which had now anew and even greater charm--the fascination of the unknown and themysterious; still, the warning I had received made me distrustful andcautious at first, for I could not help thinking about it. When weconsider how much of their life is passed in the woods, which becomeas familiar to them as the streets of our native town to us, it seemsalmost incredible that these savages have a superstitious fear of allforests, fearing them as much, even in the bright light of day, as anervous child with memory filled with ghost-stories fears a dark room.But, like the child in the dark room, they fear the forest only whenalone in it, and for this reason always hunt in couples or parties.What, then, prevented them from visiting this particular wood, whichoffered so tempting a harvest? The question troubled me not a little; atthe same time I was ashamed of the feeling, and fought against it; andin the end I made my way to the same sequestered spot where I had restedso long on my previous visit.

  In this place I witnessed a new thing and had a strange experience.Sitting on the ground in the shade of a large tree, I began to hear aconfused noise as of a coming tempest of wind mixed with shrill callsand cries. Nearer and nearer it came, and at last a multitude of birdsof many kinds, but mostly small, appeared in sight swarming through thetrees, some running on the trunks and larger branches, others flittingthrough the foliage, and many keeping on the wing, now hovering andnow darting this way or that. They were all busily searching for andpursuing the insects, moving on at the same time, and in a very fewminutes they had finished examining the trees near me and were gone; butnot satisfied with what I had witnessed, I jumped up and rushed afterthe flock to keep it in sight. All my caution and all recollection ofwhat the Indians had said was now forgot, so great was my interest inthis bird-army; but as they moved on without pause, they quickly left mebehind, and presently my career was stopped by an impenetrable tangle ofbushes, vines, and roots of large trees extending like huge cablesalong the ground. In the midst of this leafy labyrinth I sat down on aprojecting root to cool my blood before attempting to make my way backto my former position. After that tempest of motion and confused noisesthe silence of the forest seemed very profound; but before I hadbeen resting many moments it was broken by a low strain of exquisitebird-melody, wonderfully pure and expressive, unlike any musical sound Ihad ever heard before. It seemed to issue from a thick cluster of broadleaves of a creeper only a few yards from where I sat. With my eyesfixed on this green hiding-place I waited with suspended breath for itsrepetition, wondering whether any civilized being had ever listened tosuch a strain before. Surely not, I thought, else the fame of so divinea melody would long ago have been noised abroad. I thought of therialejo, the celebrated organbird or flute-bird, and of the various waysin which hearers are affected by it. To some its warbling is like thesound of a beautiful mysterious instrument, while to others it seemslike the singing of a blithe-hearted child with a highly melodiousvoice. I had often heard and listened with delight to the singing of therialejo in the Guayana forests, but this song, or musical phrase, wasutterly unlike it in character. It was pure, more expressive, softer--solow that at a distance of forty yards I could hardly have heard it.But its greatest charm was its resemblance to the human voice--a voicepurified and brightened to something almost angelic. Imagine, then, myimpatience as I sat there s
training my sense, my deep disappointmentwhen it was not repeated! I rose at length very reluctantly and slowlybegan making my way back; but when I had progressed about thirty yards,again the sweet voice sounded just behind me, and turning quickly, Istood still and waited. The same voice, but not the same song--notthe same phrase; the notes were different, more varied and rapidlyenunciated, as if the singer had been more excited. The blood rushed tomy heart as I listened; my nerves tingled with a strange new delight,the rapture produced by such music heightened by a sense of mystery.Before many moments I heard it again, not rapid now, but a softwarbling, lower than at first, infinitely sweet and tender, sinking tolisping sounds that soon ceased to be audible; the whole having lastedas long as it would take me to repeat a sentence of a dozen words. Thisseemed the singer's farewell to me, for I waited and listened in vain tohear it repeated; and after getting back to the starting-point I sat forupwards of an hour, still hoping to hear it once more!

  The weltering sun at length compelled me to quit the wood, but notbefore I had resolved to return the next morning and seek for the spotwhere I had met with so enchanting an experience. After crossing thesterile belt I have mentioned within the wood, and just before I came tothe open outer edge where the stunted trees and bushes die away on theborder of the savannah, what was my delight and astonishment at hearingthe mysterious melody once more! It seemed to issue from a clump ofbushes close by; but by this time I had come to the conclusionthat there was a ventriloquism in this woodland voice which made itimpossible for me to determine its exact direction. Of one thing I was,however, now quite convinced, and that was that the singer had beenfollowing me all the time. Again and again as I stood there listening itsounded, now so faint and apparently far off as to be scarcely audible;then all at once it would ring out bright and clear within a few yardsof me, as if the shy little thing had suddenly grown bold; but, far ornear, the vocalist remained invisible, and at length the tantalizingmelody ceased altogether.