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The World's Greatest Books [Volumes 1-15, 17-20]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1910
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Культурология
Электронная книга - «The World's Greatest Books [Volumes 1-15, 17-20]». Краткое содержание книги:
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 01 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 02 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 03 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 04 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 05 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 06 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 07 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 08 — Fiction от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 09 — Lives and Letters от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 10 — Lives and Letters от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 11 — Ancient and Mediæval History от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 12 — Modern History от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 13 — Religion and Philosophy от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 14 — Philosophy and Economics от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 15 — Science от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 17 — Poetry and Drama от Неизвестный
The world's greatest books от Mee, Arthur, 1875-1943, joint editor & Hammerton, John Alexander, Sir, 1871-1949, joint editor & McClure, S. S. (Samuel Sidney), 1857-1949, joint editor
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 19 — Travel and Adventure от Неизвестный
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 20 — Miscellaneous Literature and Index от Неизвестный
Even should the view be perfectly accidental, or should there be only a suspicion that the proscribed articles have been seen, no mercy is shown; and it is said that fathers have been the executioners of their own daughters, and husbands of their wives, when such has been the case.
VII.—The World's Greatest River Basin
The basin of the Amazon surpasses in dimensions that of any other river in the world. It is entirely situated in the tropics, on both sides of the equator, and receives over its whole extent the most abundant rains. The body of fresh water emptied by it into the ocean is, therefore, far greater than that of any other river. For richness of vegetable productions and universal fertility of soil it is unequalled on the globe.
The whole area of this wonderful region is 2,330,000 square miles. This is more than a third of all South America, and equal to two-thirds of all Europe. All western Europe could be placed within its basin, without touching its boundaries, and it would even contain our whole Indian empire.
Perhaps no country in the world contains such an amount of vegetable matter on its surface as the valley of the Amazon. Its entire extent, with the exception of some very small portions, is covered with one dense and lofty primeval forest, the most extensive and unbroken which exists on the earth. It is the great feature of the country—that which at once stamps it as a unique and peculiar region. Here we may travel for weeks and months in any direction, and scarcely find an acre of ground unoccupied by trees. The forests of the Amazon are distinguished from those of most other countries by the great variety of species of trees composing them. Instead of extensive tracts covered with pines, or oaks, or beeches, we scarcely ever see two individuals of the same species together.
The Brazil nuts are brought chiefly from the interior; the greater part from the country around the junction of the Rio Negro and Madeira with the Amazon. The tree takes more than a year to produce and ripen its fruits, which, as large and as heavy as cannon balls, fall with tremendous force from the height of a hundred feet, crashing through the branches and undergrowth, and snapping off large boughs. Persons are sometimes killed by them.
VIII.—Splendid Native Races
Comparing the accounts given by other travellers with my own observations, the Indians of the Amazon valley appear to be much superior, both physically and intellectually, to those of South Brazil and of most other parts of South America. They more closely resemble the intelligent and noble races inhabiting the western prairies of North America.
I do not remember a single circumstance in my travels so striking and so new, or that so well fulfilled all previous expectations, as my first view of the real uncivilised inhabitants of the Uaupés. I felt that I was in the midst of something new and startling, as if I had been instantaneously transported to a distant and unknown country.
The Indians of the Amazon and its tributaries are of a countless variety of tribes and nations; all of whom have peculiar languages and customs, and many of them some distinct characteristics. In many individuals of both sexes the most perfect regularity of features exists, and there are numbers who in colour alone differ from a good-looking European.
Their figures are generally superb; and I have never felt so much pleasure in gazing at the finest statue, as at these living illustrations of the beauty of the human form. The development of the chest is such as I believe never exists in the best-formed European, exhibiting a splendid series of convex undulations, without a hollow in any part of it.
Among the tribes of the Uaupés the men have the hair carefully parted and combed on each side, and tied in a queue behind. In the young men, it hangs in long locks down their necks, and, with the comb, which is invariably carried stuck in the top of the head, gives to them a most feminine appearance. This is increased by the large necklaces and bracelets of beads, and the careful extirpation of every symptom of beard.
Taking these circumstances into consideration, I am strongly of opinion that the story of the Amazons has arisen from these feminine-looking warriors encountered by the early voyagers. I am inclined to this opinion, from the effect they first produced on myself, when it was only by close examination I saw that they were men.
I cannot make out that these Indians of the Amazon have any belief that can be called a religion. They appear to have no definite idea of a God. If asked who made the rivers and the forests and the sky, they will reply that they do not know, or sometimes that they suppose it was "Tupanau," a word that appears to answer to God, but of which they understand nothing. They have much more definite ideas of a bad spirit, "Jurupari," or Devil, whom they fear, and endeavour through their "pagés," or sorcerers, to propitiate.
When it thunders, they say that the "Jurupari" is angry, and their idea of natural death is that the "Jurupari" kills them. At an eclipse they believe that this bad spirit is killing the moon, and they make all the noise they can to drive him away. One of the singular facts connected with these Indians of the Amazon valley is the resemblance between some of their customs and those of the nations most remote from them. The gravatana, or blowpipe, reappears in the sumpitan of Borneo; the great houses of the Uaupés closely resemble those of the Dyaks of the same country; while many small baskets and bamboo-boxes from Borneo and New Guinea are so similar in their form and construction to those of the Amazon, that they would be supposed to belong to adjoining tribes.
The main feature in the personal character of the Indians of this part of South America is a degree of diffidence, bashfulness, or coldness, which affects all their actions. It is this that produces their quiet deliberation, their circuitous way of introducing a subject they have come to speak about, talking half an hour on different topics before mentioning it. Owing to this feeling, they will run away if displeased rather than complain, and will never refuse to undertake what is asked them, even when they are unable or do not intend to perform it. They scarcely ever quarrel among themselves, work hard, and submit willingly to authority. They are ingenious and skilful workmen and readily adopt any customs of civilised life introduced among them.
ELIOT WARBURTON
The Crescent and the Cross
I.—Alexandria
Bartholomew Eliot George Warburton, who wrote as Eliot Warburton, was born in 1810 in Tullamore, Ireland, and died in 1852. He graduated at Cambridge, where he was the fellow student and intimate friend of Hallam, Monckton Milnes, and Kinglake (of "Eothen" fame). He studied law and was called to the bar, but instead of practising in the legal profession took to a most adventurous career of travel, and wrote of his experiences in a spirited and romantic style which soon secured him a wide reputation. His eight works include "The Crescent and the Cross," which appeared in 1845, after his wanderings in Egypt, Syria, Turkey, and Greece; "Memoirs of Prince Rupert," and "Darien, or the Merchant Prince." He was sailing for Panama, as an agent of the Atlantic and Pacific Company, when he was lost in the steamship Amazon, which was burnt off Land's End on January 4, 1852. Warburton was beloved for his generous, amiable, and chivalrous disposition. His peculiar gift for embodying in graphic terms his appreciation of striking scenery and his picturesque delineation of foreign manners and customs give his works a permanent place in the classics of travel.
We took leave of Old England and the Old Year together. On the first of January we left Southampton; on the evening of the 2nd we took leave of England at Falmouth. Towards evening, on the 18th day since leaving England, the low land of Egypt was visible from the mast-head. The only object visible from the decks was a faint speck on the horizon, but that speck was Pompey's Pillar. This is the site Alexander selected from his wide dominions, and which Napoleon pronounced to be unrivalled in importance. Here stood the great library of antiquity, and here the Hebrew Scriptures expanded into Greek under the hands of the Septuagint. Here Cleopatra revelled with her Roman conquerors. Here St. Mark preached the truth on which Origen attempted to refine, and here Athanasius held warlike controversy.