South America

We had sailed in a southeasternly direction from New York twelve days when we rounded Cape St. Roque, the easternmost point of South America. A line drawn due north from this point would pass through the Atlantic midway between Europe and America. If we had sailed directly south we should have touched the western instead of the eastern coast, for the reason that practically the entire continent of South America lies east of the parallel of longitude which passes through New York.

There was a time in the life of the Anglo-Saxon race When it became necessary for at least a portion of it to go out into a new country in order that it might achieve the larger destiny it was to fulfill in the world. God was behind that exodus as truly as he was behind the transplanting of Abraham into a new environment. Here in our country, unfettered by despotic traditions and precedents, the Anglo-Saxon achieved religious and political liberty with a rapidity and thoroughness that could not have been possible in the old Continent of Europe.

The city of Rio is the center of life in Brazil. We entered the Bay of Rio after nightfall on the sixth of June. The miles and miles of lights in the city of Rio on the one side, and of Nietheroy on the other, gave us the impression that we were in some gigantic fair grounds. Missionaries Entzminger, Shepard, Maddox and Mrs. Entzminger came aboard to welcome us and bring us ashore. We were taken to the Rio Baptist College and Seminary, where we were entertained in good old Tennessee style by the Shepards. This school building was built in 1849 by Dom Pedro II.

That I may give you a glimpse of the country life in Brazil, and also some impression of country mission work, I invite you to take a trip with Missionary Maddox and myself to the little hamlet of Parahyba do Sul, in the interior of the State of Rio.

It was our good fortune while in Rio to be received by the President of the Republic, Dr. Nilo Pecanha. Missionaries Shepard, Langston and Ginsburg and Dr. Nogueira Paranagua escorted me. When we started I suggested that we take a street car. Not so those Brazilians! We must go in an automobile. We were very careful to wear our Prince Albert coats, too; for, above all things, the Brazilian is a master in punctilious ceremonies. We were ushered into the waiting room by a doorkeeper, a finely-liveried mulatto with a large chain around his shoulders to indicate his authority.

When I went to South America I decided that I would spend little time upon the material aspects of the trip, but would, on the other hand, attempt to arrive at an understanding of the religious conditions and needs of the people. I consider that the religious needs are the abiding and vital interests of any people.

One day in 1908, when my presidential term was coming to a close, Father Zahm, a priest whom I knew, came in to call on me. Father Zahm and I had been cronies for some time, because we were both of us fond of Dante and of history and of science - I had always commended to theologians his book, "Evolution and Dogma." He was an Ohio boy, and his early schooling had been obtained in old-time American fashion in a little log school; where, by the way, one of the other boys was Januarius Aloysius MacGahan, afterward the famous war correspondent and friend of Skobeloff.

On the afternoon of December 9 we left the attractive and picturesque city of Asuncion to ascend the Paraguay. With generous courtesy the Paraguayan Government had put at my disposal the gunboat-yacht of the President himself, a most comfortable river steamer, and so the opening days of our trip were pleasant in every way. The food was good, our quarters were clean, we slept well, below or on deck, usually without our mosquito-nettings, and in daytime the deck was pleasant under the awnings.

The morning after our arrival at Corumba I asked Colonel Rondon to inspect our outfit; for his experience of what is necessary in tropical travelling has been gained through a quarter of a century of arduous exploration in the wilderness. It was Fiala who had assembled our food-tents, cooking-utensils, and supplies of all kinds, and he and Sigg, during their stay in Corumba, had been putting everything in shape for our start.

At Corumba our entire party, and all their belongings, came aboard our good little river boat, the Nyoac. Christmas Day saw us making our way steadily up-stream against the strong current, and between the green and beautiful banks of the upper Paraguay. The shallow little steamer was jammed with men, dogs, rifles, partially cured skins, boxes of provisions, ammunition, tools, and photographic supplies, bags containing tents, cots, bedding, and clothes, saddles, hammocks, and the other necessaries for a trip through the "great wilderness," the "Matto Grosso" of western Brazil.