The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey

by Candice Millard

  In temperate forests, with their large stands of similar trees, reproduction can frequently be accomplished in fairly indiscriminate fashion. Given the large number of nearby trees of the same species, pollen can be successfully transferred to other trees of the same species by a wide range of means, from insects to the wind alone, and the dispersal of seeds can be achieved through simple methods. A downy parachute of fluff carries the seed of the cottonwood randomly upon the breeze, and the apple doesn’t need to fall far from the tree in order to achieve its reproductive mission.

  In the rain forest, by contrast, the requirements for successful reproduction are much more demanding. The wide separation of trees or plants of a single species means that pollinators must be attracted very selectively, and the intense competition for every available food source means that fruits and seeds must evolve highly refined strategies of dispersal if they are to avoid being consumed or destroyed long before they reach their intended destination.

  Plants and trees in the rain forest must find ways not only to attract pollinators, but to attract only those that will reliably go on to seek out other members of the same species, even if they are some distance away. For this reason, many plants and trees have “co-evolved,” or developed highly specialized relationships, with the insects, birds, or mammals that pollinate them, creating mutual dependencies aimed at providing access for those pollinators—and keeping all others away.

  Because it touches nearly every aspect of life in the rain forest, the demands of this reproductive quest were responsible for many of the bright colors and distinctive features that Roosevelt and his men could see, feel, and smell around them. Flowers that attract hummingbirds, for example, are typically red or orange in color so that they can be seen easily in daylight, and have deep throats to make it difficult for other animals to reach their nectar. Flowers that have evolved to attract some beetles smell like urine or rotting meat. Flowers that attract bats tend to be green or cream-colored, because they need to be smelled rather than seen, bloom only at night, and are frequently located on the trunk, rather than the branches of a tree, so that bats may reach them more easily.

  These specialized strategies may be combined with symphonic sophistication, as in the case of the giant Victoria amazonica or royal water lily, whose flowers bloom, turn white, emit a strong odor, and sharply increase their temperature to attract the scarab beetles that pollinate them. When they arrive, the flower chamber closes around the feeding beetles, imprisoning them so that they become covered with pollen. Approximately twenty-four hours later, the flower changes to a red color that does not attract beetles, cools off, and releases the beetles, which then fly on, carrying the pollen to newly heated, white, fragrant lily flowers farther down the line.

  The complex defense mechanisms, timing sequences, and dispersal strategies that characterize pollination in the rain forest are compounded when it comes to the fruits, seeds, and nuts that the expedition had hoped to eat during its journey down the River of Doubt. Given the high cost of producing them, such precious offspring are protected with a striking array of defenses. To ensure that it is not eaten before it is ready for dispersal, most fruit is protected by distasteful or poisonous chemical defense compounds until it is mature—a phenomenon that, in its most basic form, is familiar to every child who has eaten an unripe apple. Fruit that is dispersed when it is eaten, moreover, frequently remains visually inconspicuous—often green—until it has developed fully enough to accomplish its evolutionary purpose. Only then does it transform itself to attract the attention of its intended distributors by turning bright-colored, fragrant, and delicious.

  Even when they are mature, fruits and seeds cannot be wasted on just any hungry passerby, and have evolved to narrowly target only specific dispersers. To avoid ground-based predators, and to give access to birds and other preferred dispersers, many fruits and seedpods are produced high in the canopy, where they were out of the expedition’s sight. To ensure that fruits are not simply eaten one by one and destroyed, many plants and trees have adapted by “masting,” or producing mass fruitings at irregular intervals—a strategy that defeats the development of unwanted predators by alternately starving and overwhelming them.

  For Roosevelt and his men, the evolutionary sophistication of pollination and fruit production in the rain forest resulted in a frustrating and confusing inability to glean sustenance from the plants and trees around them. As well as hinging on rainfall or other weather conditions as the men supposed, for example, the abundance or scarcity of the Brazil nuts that they so hoped to find was also the result of a delicately balanced chain of apparently unrelated factors, all of which were necessary for their production, and any one of which could have served as the underlying cause of the men’s frustration.

  As would-be cultivators of the Brazil nut would later discover to their dismay, the tree’s hooded flowers have evolved to require pollination by a small group of large-bodied bees which are strong enough to pry them open. Those bees, in turn, rely for their own reproduction on a certain type of rain forest orchid, whose absence or disruption is devastating to the production of nearby Brazil nut trees. Even when a mature fruit is successfully produced, moreover, the Brazil nut’s hard casing is so effective at deterring unwanted predators that it can only be opened and dispersed by the agouti, a small rodent with chisel-like teeth, whose presence also becomes essential to the tree’s reproductive process.

  Like the men’s inability to find game animals, therefore, the difficulty of finding fruit and nuts reflected their own unfamiliarity with the rain forest, and the dizzying complexity of the reproductive systems at work around them. In its intense and remorseless competition for every available nutrient, the Amazon offered little just for the taking. To the extent they were obliged to rely on the jungle for food, the men of the expedition were destined to do without.

  * * *

  AS A RESULT of their restricted rations, the men were beginning to feel the effects of a near-starvation diet. As is common in instances of extreme hunger, they began to obsess about food. When they were not looking at it, they were talking about it, and when they were not talking about it, they were thinking about it. “A curious effect on our having been on short rations for so long showed itself in our conversation in the evenings,” Cherrie wrote. “We talked much about the river and its rapids, which were ever present in our thoughts; but we also talked incessantly about food.” Like castaways on a desert island, the men discussed in delicious detail what they were going to eat when they got home. “Colonel Roosevelt always wanted a mutton chop ‘with a tail to it!’” Cherrie recalled. Kermit was looking forward to a bowl of strawberries and cream, and Cherrie, the Vermonter, dreamed of pancakes and maple syrup.

  Although carried out in good spirits, these talks were always darkened by the reality of their situation. When the conversations went on too long, and his longing for not just food but home and Belle became too painful to bear, Kermit often had to get up and walk away. By this point in the expedition, with drowning, disease, Indian attack, and starvation waiting to claim their lives, all of the men understood that they might never again see home. “When food was scarcest and things looked most gloomy the Colonel and I had a great many talks about what we were going to have when we got out,” Cherrie wrote. “I don’t think either of us expected to come out.”

  The men feared for their lives, but they had not yet lost hope, and even small victories helped to revive their spirits. On March 16, Cherrie had written in his diary that it was “very doubtful if all our party ever reaches Manaos.” The very next day, however, he had to admit that there had been a “rift in the clouds of our misfortune.” At the foot of a second series of rapids, the men found a deep, seventy-foot-wide tributary, the largest they had yet come across. The discovery of this river was cause for celebration. Not only did it banish any lingering thoughts that the River of Doubt might be simply an affluent of the Gy-Paraná, as Lyra had argued—the Gy-Paraná certainly did no
t have any tributaries of this size—but it convinced even Roosevelt that the river they were descending was one of great importance. “Up to this point it was still possible to give way to the existing doubts in the mind of Mr. Roosevelt and of some of the other members of the Expedition, relative to the importance of the river,” Rondon wrote. “But now there was no motive whatever for hesitation.” Thrilled that the River of Doubt was going to have a prominent place on the map of South America, Rondon, perhaps in a gesture of forgiveness toward the impulsive young American who had cost him the life of one of his men, decided that he would name this tributary, the river’s largest, the Rio Kermit.

  As momentous as the discovery of the Rio Kermit was, the men were made much happier by the good fortune they enjoyed that night, as they made camp at the mouth of the tributary. Not only did they find and recover two of the boxes of provisions that had been lost when Simplicio drowned, but, to everyone’s great surprise and joy, Lyra caught two fat fish. Few of the men could imagine a happier sight than the lieutenant holding aloft two large, deep-bodied, delicious-tasting pacu, the first fish he or any of the men had been able to catch on the River of Doubt. Even better, Antonio Pareci, one of their most experienced paddlers, assured them that pacu never traveled up heavy rapids. He was certain that, if there were more rapids to come, they would be small ones that the pacu could jump and would, therefore, certainly not necessitate a portage.

  The good mood carried over into the next morning, when, during his usual recitation of the Orders of the Day, Rondon officially renamed the River of Doubt. With all of the flourish that he could manage in their tiny, ramshackle camp, the Brazilian colonel formally announced to the small band of dirty and exhausted men standing before him—in his words, “the Brazilian and American Commissions”—that “from that day onward the river which we had since 1909 called ‘Duvida’ would henceforth be known as the ‘Roosevelt.’”

  Although Roosevelt knew that the Brazilian government had planned to name the river in his honor if it proved to be a large and important one, he was surprised that they had carried through with the idea. “I had urged, and Kermit had urged, as strongly as possible, that the name be kept as Rio da Dúvida,” he wrote. “We felt that the ‘River of Doubt’ was an unusually good name.” Roosevelt also realized, however, that this was a generous sentiment on the part of the Brazilians and an occasion of rare good cheer for the members of the expedition. Had he protested the river’s new name, the moment would have been ruined.

  The men’s happiness and the spontaneous display of good will that followed the renaming ceremony proved Roosevelt right. After he had finished his proclamation, Rondon led all of the men in a hearty cheer for the United States, for Roosevelt, and for Kermit. “The camaradas,” Roosevelt wrote, “cheered with a will.” Touched by the sentiment and by the simple but well-intentioned ceremony, Roosevelt responded with three cheers for Brazil, and then another round for Colonel Rondon, Lyra, and Dr. Cajazeira, and yet another for the camaradas. Realizing that everyone had then been cheered except for Cherrie, Lyra proposed three cheers for the American naturalist. All of the men were “in high good humor” by the time the meeting broke up and they prepared to resume their journey, Roosevelt wrote.

  * * *

  THE MEN began that day, March 18, with a renewed sense of their common cause and hope for their own lives. Setting off as a divided expedition, the thirteen men on foot were thrilled when they found a narrow path that ran along the river’s edge. The trail made their journey faster and easier and, for the barefoot camaradas, took away much of the danger of stepping on a snake. It quickly became obvious, however, that the well-worn route was not a game trail but an Indian path.

  The men felt, saw, and heard the Indians’ presence everywhere they turned. The dogs were on edge. Running ahead of the rest of the expedition, they would stop short and bark excitedly into the forest, their attention caught by some distinctive human scent that the men could not detect. Increasingly bold, the Indians did not bother to hide their presence from the members of the expedition. They left fresh footprints in the mud, and they let themselves be heard. As the men walked between the river and the jungle, Indian voices broke through the heavy leaves, clear and guttural, and all the more terrifying for being disembodied.

  The Indians had decided to let the members of the expedition know that they were watching them, but they carefully followed the protocol of survival in the rain forest, and remained invisible themselves. Rounding a bend, the men again suddenly found themselves confronting a fishing village—this time bearing clear signs that it had been abandoned only hours or even minutes before their arrival. The village consisted of three huts, whose arrangement was indicative of the Indians’ warlike life-style. Each of the huts, which were low, oblong, and covered entirely in palm leaves, had only one small opening, which was artfully hidden underneath the roof’s leaves. Not only were the huts’ entrances concealed, but so, from each angle, was one of the huts. Two of the huts had been built side by side, and the third had been tucked in between the other two perpendicularly. “In this way if they were to be attacked from one side or another,” Rondon explained, “one at least would be covered by the other two, and . . . being invisible to the assailants, could serve as a refuge for the women and children.”

  Before leaving the village, Rondon insisted on once again offering the Indians a sign of the expedition’s friendly intentions. The best way to do that, he knew, was through gifts. While the Cinta Larga likely watched from the forest, the men tied an ax, a knife, and some strings of beads to a pole. The offering of such gifts was a calculated gamble. They might have bolstered the position of the Cinta Larga who had been arguing against attacking the expedition. On the other hand, they could have been a tempting reminder of the provisions that the expedition was carrying—food and useful equipment that, if the Indians attacked, could be theirs in its entirety rather than doled out as token gifts. “There is no doubt that there are many Indians on all sides about us,” Cherrie wrote in his journal that night. “If they are to prove friendly or hostile remains to be seen.”

  Although he was eager to make contact with this unknown tribe, Rondon understood the extreme danger that he and his men were in, and had long since posted sentinels to watch over the members of the expedition while they slept, but he knew that a few frightened men were little protection against a silent band of Indians armed with clubs and poisonous arrows. One night, Cherrie, who, after years in the wilderness, had trained himself to be a light sleeper, watched as Rondon climbed out of his hammock at 2:00 a.m. With his military khakis pulled over his sinewy frame, the Brazilian officer stepped out of their tent and disappeared into the black forest, prepared to protect his men against an attack if he could, but unwilling to fire a single shot in their defense.

  * * *

  RONDON’S CONCERN about the Indians did not mean that he agreed with the expedition’s forced march through the rain forest. He had faced unknown, unpredictable Indian tribes before, and if he was killed with an arrow or the entire expedition was massacred, he accepted that fate as the price of completing the work to which he had devoted his life. Roosevelt, on the other hand, was more determined than ever to finish their journey as quickly as possible, and was willing to make whatever sacrifices were necessary to minimize the dangers to the men, especially to Kermit.

  Under the strain of their diametrically opposed ambitions, Rondon and Roosevelt’s relationship began to fray. A couple of hours after they had passed the Indian village, the men found another tributary, this one broad and shallow with a small green-and-white waterfall that splashed into the River of Doubt from its right bank. While Roosevelt and the rest of the men sat down near the fall to rest for a moment and admire its beauty, Lyra and Rondon measured the tributary and made plans to study it more carefully. Roosevelt, however, insisted that the expedition keep moving. Frustrated that once again he was unable to do what he had come to do—not just map the river but survey the surroun
ding region—Rondon bowed to Roosevelt’s wishes but later complained that he “could only make a small reconnaissance of this new tributary, along its bank, as it was necessary to attend to the wish of the chief of the American commission relative to accelerating our voyage.”

  The men made camp soon afterward at the foot of a short stretch of rapids. It was here, in the woods surrounding a large bay, that they finally found the right kind of trees for boat building. They would be taking a chance in stopping for several days to carve new dugouts while they were still so close to the Indian village, but if they ever hoped to make it home, they could not continue at such a slow pace and with a divided expedition. Nor did they know when they would again find suitable trees. They had not chosen well when they built their first dugout, and it had cost them dearly. Instead of looking for a type of wood that would be buoyant in the river, they had selected the tree for its size. Like many rain forest trees that have adapted to protect themselves from insect predators, however, the tree they chose was extremely hard and heavy, making it useless for boat building. The Aripuanã’s timber, as Cherrie would later write, “proved to be so dense and heavy that a chip thrown into the water sank like lead. This lack of buoyancy was one of the chief reasons why we had lost our new canoe.”

  The men had learned their lesson. The trees that they found near the new tributary were araputanga, a species of mahogany that is resistant to rot, easy to carve, and nearly as light as cork. But when work on the new dugouts began early the next day, the camaradas did not get off to an auspicious start. The first araputanga tree that they chose was very close to camp, and suddenly collapsed in the wrong direction. By the time the tree hit the ground, it had knocked over a series of other, smaller trees, which in turn crashed into Franca’s makeshift kitchen. “Hard-working, willing, and tough though the camaradas were,” Roosevelt wrote, “they naturally did not have the skill of northern lumberjacks.”