42 UP THE PARAGUAY [chap, ii 



the water it is devoured alive. Here on the Paraguay 

 the natives hold them in much respect, whereas the 

 caymans are not feared at all. The only redeeming 

 feature about them is that they are themselves fairly 

 good to eat, although with too many bones. 



At daybreak of the third day, finding we were still 

 moored off Concepcion, we were rowed ashore, and 

 strolled off through the streets of the quamt, picturesque 

 old town ; a town which, like Asuncion, was founded by 

 the conquiscadores three-quarters of a century before 

 our own Enghsh and Dutch forefathers landed in what 

 is now the United States. The Jesuits then took prac- 

 tically complete possession of what is now Paraguay, 

 controlling and Christianizing the Indians, and raising 

 their flourishing missions to a pitch of prosperity they 

 never elsewhere achieved. They were expelled by the 

 civil authorities (backed by the other representatives of 

 ecclesiastical authority) some fifty years before Spanish 

 South America became independent. But they had 

 already made the language of the Indians, Guarany, 

 a culture-tongue, reducing it to writing, and printing 

 rehgious books in it. Guarany is one of the most wide- 

 spread of the Indian tongues, being originally found in 

 various closely allied forms, not only in Paraguay, but 

 in Uruguay and over the major part of Brazil. It 

 remains here and there, as a lingua geral at least, and 

 doubtless in cases as an original tongue, among the wild 

 tribes. In most of Brazil, as around Para and around 

 Sao Paulo, it has left its traces in place-names, but has 

 been completely superseded as a language by Por- 

 tuguese. In Paraguay it stiU exists side by side with 

 Spanish as the common language of the lower people and 

 as a familiar tongue among the upper classes. The 

 blood of the people is mixed, their language dual ; the 



