“Events that perhaps lacked a historian” - The Scramble for the Amazon and the Lost Paradise of Euclides da Cunha - page 332

The recommendation was accepted. A decree from President Nicolás de Pierola ordered the de-
marcation of Puerto Victoria for the establishment of a comisaría destined to protect the colonists of
those lands, and in great envy of the excellent situation of the Oliveira estate, revealed the intention
of taking exclusive possession of the area by not permitting any settler within the radius of one kilo-
meter.
Peru acquired a really admirable river property. And the Brazilians withdrew.
Five years passed. In 1905 a Parisian tourist, J. Delbeque, descended the Pachitea on his travels
to Amazonas and wouldn't have even noticed the formerly flourishing estancia had he not been ac-
companied by some tame Indians who knew the area well. There at the top of the river bluff, which
the floods were eroding, one could see just some collapsed roofs and the remains of the agriculture
choked by wild brush.
It was a ruin.
Travelers would stay for a few hours in order to dry their soaked clothing in the heat of a fire fed
with rotting doors and buckled frames of the old houses, a regular practice of all who passed there on
the way to Iquitos. Our voyager mused sorrowfully that if things continued like this, Puerto Victoria
would soon be only a memory.
He then left, rowing as fast as possible, fleeing the outpost that had been left in the most complete
abandonment.