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Show MALLERY.] PETROGLYPHS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 39 the natives were probably as rude then as at the present time. But it must not be forgotten that * * nations of very different descent, when in a similar uncivilized state, having the same disposition to simplify and generalize outlines, and being impelled by inherent mental dispositions to form rythmical repetitions and series, may be led to produce similar signs and symbols. * * * Some miles from Encaramada, there rises, in the middle of the savannah, the rock Tepu- Mereme, or painted rock. It shews several figures of animals and symbolical outlines which resemble much those observed by us at some distance above Encaramada, near Caycara, in 7° 5' to 7° 4C lat., and 66° 28' to 67° 23' W. long, from Greenwich. Rocks thus marked are found between the Cassiquiare and the Atabapo ( in 2° 5' to 3° 20' lat.)* and what is particularly remarkable, 560 geographical miles farther to the East in the solitudes of the Parime. This last fact is placed beyond a doubt by the journal of Nicholas Hortsman, of which I have seen a copy in the handwriting of the celebrated D'Anville. That simple and modest traveller wrote down every day, on the spot, what had appeared to him most worthy of notice, and he deserves perhaps the more credence because, being full of dissatisfaction at having failed to discover the objects of his researches, the Lake of Dorado, with lumps of gold and a diamond mine, he looked with a certain degree of contempt on whatever fell in his way. He found, on the 16th of April, 1749, on the banks of the Rupunuri, at the spot where the river winding between the Macarana mountains forms several small cascades, and before arriving in the district immediately round Lake Amncu, " rocks covered with figures,"- or, as he says in Portugese, " de varias letras." We were shown at the rock of Culimacari, on the banks of the Cassiquiare, signs which were called characters, arranged in lines- but they were only ill- shaped figures of heavenly bodies, boa- serpents, and the utensils employed in preparing manioc meal. I have never found among these painted rocks ( piedras pintadas) any symmetrical arrangement or any regular even- spaced characters. I am therefore disposed to think that the word " letras" in Hortsmann's journal must not be taken in the strictest sense. Schomburgk was not so fortunate as to rediscover the rock seen by Hortsmann, but he has seen and described others on the banks of the Esseqnibo, near the cascade of Warraputa. " This cascade," he says, ' Ms celebrated not only for its height but also for the quantity of figures, cut on the rock, which have great resemblance to those which I have seen in the island of St. John, one of the Virgin Islands, and which I consider to be, without doubt, the work of the Caribs, by whom that part of the Antilles was formerly inhabited. I made the utmost efforts to detach portions of the rock which contained the inscription, and which I desired to take with me, but the stone was too hard and fever had taken away my strength. Neither promises nor threats could prevail on the Indians to give a single blow with a hammer to these rocks- the venerable monuments of the superior mental cultivation of their predecessors. They regard them as the work of the Great Spirit, and the different tribes who we met with, though living at a great distance, were nevertheless acquainted with them. Terror was painted on the faces of my Indian companions, who appeared to expect every moment that the fire of heaven would fall on my head. I saw clearly that my endeavors would be fruitless, and I contented myself with bringing away a complete drawing of these memorials." • • • Even the veneration everywhere testified by the Indians of the present day for these rude sculptures of their predecessors, shews that they have no idea of the execution of similar works. There is another circumstance which should be mentioned: between Encaramada and Caycara, on the banks of the Orinoco, a number of these hieroglyphical figures are sculptured on the face of precipices at a height which could now be reached only by means of extraordinarily high scaffolding. If one asks the natives how these figures have been cut, they answer, laughing, as if it were a fact of which none but a white man could be ignorant, that " in the days of the great waters their fathers went in canoes at that height." Thus a geological fancy is made to afford an answer to the problem presented by a civilization which has long passed away. |
