Note 99 — Chapter XIII · UP THE PARANA.

The description of this magnificent and important river, by the authors of ‘Letters from Paraguay,’ is too accurate and graphic to be omitted here, viz.:—The Paraná, having its source in the southern part of the Brazilian province of Goyaz, flows down from latitude 81 degrees south, still increased, as it runs, by numerous tributary springs. It is uninterrupted in its course by any obstacle to navigation, except by that formidable one, called the Salto Grande, (the Great Waterfall, literally, the Great Leap,) which in latitude 24 degrees, with a noise and tumult, heard many miles off, dashes its foaming mass of water over rocks, precipices, and chasms, of the most stupendous character. Resuming after this its placid course, the wide and glassy Paraná, richly wooded on both sides, and navigable by small vessels, pours down its salubrious waters impregnated with sarsaparilla, till, at Corrientes, it forms its junction with the River Paraguay. From that point the two rivers joined, go under the name of the one river, Paraná, the latter being, sometimes, though erroneously, below this, considered the parent stream. The Paraná discharges itself into the River Plate, by several mouths; by that of the Paraná Guazú, at which point the waters of the Uruguay also fall in: of the Paraná Miní, lower down; and of the Paraná de las Palmas, still near to Buenos Ayres. Thus formed, the Rio de la Plata pours its accumulated waters into the Atlantic; and although its mouth at the two opposite capes of Santa Maria and San Antonio is one hundred and fifty miles wide, it does no more than correspond to the grandeur of the inland navigation. From its source, in Matto Grosso, latitude 14 degrees south, till its confluence with the Paraná at Corrientes, the River Paraguay has already run a course of 1,200 miles; from Corrientes to Buenos Ayres, the distance measured by both these streams under the one name of the Paraná is 740; while from Buenos Ayres to Cape St. Antonio and Maria, the combined waters of the Paraguay, Paraná, and Uruguay, united under the one name of River Plate, run a farther distance of 200; making a total course of 2,150 miles, including the windings, which are often of a very sweeping kind. Of this immense tract of water, fifteen hundred miles are navigable by vessels drawing ten feet. The river abounds with fish from its mouth to its source. The pexerey (king’s fish), the dorado, mullet, pacū (a sort of turbot), and many others, are found in it; its banks are for the most part richly studded with wood; its various islands are adorned with beautiful shrubs, evergreens, creepers, &c.; the woods abound with game, and the adjacent country teems with cattle. The waters are highly salubrious; the soil all along the banks of the river, with the exception of the Great Chaco, is rich and fertile in the highest degree. But notwithstanding all these advantages—notwithstanding that the country has been for three hundred years in the possession of a civilized European nation—after I had galloped two hundred and eighty leagues, I did not see above four or five small towns. Not more than a like number of vessels were to be descried on my route, while at every fifteen miles distance a miserable hut, with its half-dozen inhabitants, was alone interposed to relieve the monotony of the scene. The secret of all the silence, solitude, and abandonment of Nature to herself, which I saw and lamented, is of course to be traced to the inadequate means which have hitherto been used to provide even a semblance of the population necessary to cover a country of such vast fertility and extent.