Chapter 50

THE BAY OF ALL BEAUTIES.

I have said that I must pass over Rio without a description; but
just now such a flood of scented reminiscences steals over me,
that I must needs yield and recant, as I inhale that musky air.

More than one hundred and fifty miles' circuit of living green
hills embosoms a translucent expanse, so gemmed in by sierras of
grass, that among the Indian tribes the place was known as "The
Hidden Water." On all sides, in the distance, rise high conical
peaks, which at sunrise and sunset burn like vast tapers; and
down from the interior, through vineyards and forests, flow
radiating streams, all emptying into the harbour.

Talk not of Bahia de Todos os Santos--the Bay of All Saints; for
though that be a glorious haven, yet Rio is the Bay of all
Rivers--the Bay of all Delights--the Bay of all Beauties. From
circumjacent hill-sides, untiring summer hangs perpetually in
terraces of vivid verdure; and, embossed with old mosses, convent
and castle nestle in valley and glen.

All round, deep inlets run into the green mountain land, and,
overhung with wild Highlands, more resemble Loch Katrines than
Lake Lemans. And though Loch Katrine has been sung by the
bonneted Scott, and Lake Leman by the coroneted Byron; yet here,
in Rio, both the loch and the lake are but two wild flowers in a
prospect that is almost unlimited. For, behold! far away and
away, stretches the broad blue of the water, to yonder soft-
swelling hills of light green, backed by the purple pinnacles
and pipes of the grand Organ Mountains; fitly so called, for in
thunder-time they roll cannonades down the bay, drowning the
blended bass of all the cathedrals in Rio. Shout amain, exalt
your voices, stamp your feet, jubilate, Organ Mountains! and roll
your Te Deums round the world!

What though, for more than five thousand five hundred years, this
grand harbour of Rio lay hid in the hills, unknown by the Catholic
Portuguese? Centuries ere Haydn performed before emperors and kings,
these Organ Mountains played his Oratorio of the Creation, before
the Creator himself. But nervous Haydn could not have endured that
cannonading choir, since this composer of thunderbolts himself died at
last through the crashing commotion of Napoleon's bombardment of Vienna.

But all mountains are Organ Mountains: the Alps and the Himalayas;
the Appalachian Chain, the Ural, the Andes, the Green Hills and the
White. All of them play anthems forever: The Messiah, and Samson, and
Israel in Egypt, and Saul, and Judas Maccabeus, and Solomon.

Archipelago Rio! ere Noah on old Ararat anchored his ark, there
lay anchored in you all these green, rocky isles I now see. But
God did not build on you, isles! those long