lovers of venison, and agouties, which are the hares and rabbits of
Central America; and tatous belonging to the order of edentates, with
their scaly shells of patterns of mosaic.
And truly Benito showed more than virtue, and even genuine heroism,
when he came across some tapirs, called “antas” in Brazil,
diminutives of the elephant, already nearly undiscoverable on the
banks of the Upper Amazon and its tributaries, pachyderms so dear to
the hunters for their rarity, so appreciated by the gourmands for
their meat, superior far to beef, and above all for the protuberance
on the nape of the neck, which is a morsel fit for a king.
His gun almost burned his fingers, but faithful to his promise he
kept it quiet.
But yet–and he cautioned his sister about this–the gun would go off
in spite of him, and probably register a master-stroke in sporting
annals, if within range there should come a _”tamandoa assa,”_ a kind
of large and very curious ant-eater.
Happily the big ant-eater did not show himself, neither did any
panthers, leopards, jaguars, guepars, or cougars, called
indifferently ounces in South America, and to whom it is not
advisable to get too near.
“After all,” said Benito, who stopped for an instant, “to walk is
very well, but to walk without an object—-”
“Without an object!” replied his sister; “but our object is to see,
to admire, to visit for the last time these forests of Central
America, which we shall not find again in Para, and to bid them a
fast farewell.”
“Ah! an idea!”
It was Lina who spoke.
“An idea of Lina’s can be no other than a silly one,” said Benito,
shaking his head.
“It is unkind, brother,” said Minha, “to make fun of Lina when she
has been thinking how to give our walk the object which you have just
regretted it lacks.”
“Besides, Mr. Benito, I am sure my idea will please you,” replied the
mulatto.
“Well, what is it?” asked Minha.
“You see that liana?”
And Lina pointed to a liana of the _”cipos”_ kind, twisted round a
gigantic sensitive mimosa, whose leaves, light as feathers, shut up
at the least disturbance.
“Well?” said Benito.
“I proposed,” replied Minha, “that we try to follow that liana to its
very end.”
“It is an idea, and it is an object!” observed Benito, “to follow
this liana, no matter what may be the obstacles, thickets, underwood,
rocks, brooks, torrents, to let nothing stop us, not even—-”
“Certainly, you are right, brother!” said Minha; “Lina is a trifle
absurd.”
“Come on, then!” replied her brother; “you say that Lina is absurd so
as to say that Benito is absurd to approve of it!”
“Well, both of you are absurd, if that will amuse you,” returned
Minha. “Let us follow the liana!”
“You are not afraid?” said Manoel.
“Still objections!” shouted Benito.
“Ah, Manoel! you would not speak like that if you were already on
your way and Minha was waiting for you at the end.”
“I am silent,” replied Manoel; “I have no more to say. I obey. Let us
follow the liana!”
And off they went as happy as children home for their holidays.
This vegetable might take them far if they determined to follow it to
its extremity, like the thread of Ariadne, as far almost as that
which the heiress of Minos used to lead her from the labyrinth, and
perhaps entangle them more deeply.
It was in fact a creeper of the salses family, one of the cipos known
under the name of the red _”japicanga,”_ whose length sometimes
measures several miles. But, after all, they could leave it when they
liked.
The cipo passed from one tree to another without breaking its
continuity, sometimes twisting round the trunks, sometimes garlanding
the branches, here jumping form a dragon-tree to a rosewood, then
from a gigantic chestnut, the _”Bertholletia excelsa,”_ to some of
the wine palms, _”baccabas,”_ whose branches have been appropriately
compared by Agassiz to long sticks of coral flecked with green. Here
round _”tucumas,”_ or ficuses, capriciously twisted like centenarian
olive-trees, and of which Brazil had fifty-four varieties; here round
the kinds of euphorbias, which produce caoutchouc, _”gualtes,”_ noble