The sight of such a flat land did not match the ideas we had formed about the island of Margarita. While we tried hard to match what we saw with what appeared on our map a look-out sighted some small fishing-boats. The captain of the Pizarro called them with a cannon shot: but this signal is useless in places where the weak confront the strong only to be crushed. The boats escaped to the west. The coasts from a distance are like clouds, where each observer sees the form of the objects that occupy his imagination. Our readings on the chronometer contradicted our maps, and we were lost in useless conjectures. Some took dunes for Indian huts, and pointed out the place where the fort of Pampatar was situated; others saw herds of goats common in the dry valleys of Saint John; or the high mountains of Macanao, partly hidden by clouds. The captain decided to send a pilot ashore, and the men prepared to lower the longboat.

After travelling several hours downhill over scattered blocks of stone we suddenly found we had reached the end of the Santa María jungle. As far as our eyes could see a vast plain spread out, its grass revived by the rainy season. Looking down on to the tree-tops it seemed as if we were looking at a dark green carpet below us. The jungle clearings seemed like huge funnels in which we recognized the delicate pinnate leaves of the praga and irasse palms. The countryside is extremely picturesque due to the Sierra of Guàcharo whose northern slopes are steep and form a rocky wall some 3, feet high. There is little vegetation on this wall, so you can follow the calcareous strata. The peak itself is flat.

The tribes of the Upper Orinoco, the Atabapo and the Inirida, worship only the forces of nature. The principle of good is called Cachimana; it is the manitu, the great spirit, that controls the seasons and ripens fruit. Next to Cachimana there is the principle of evil, Jolokiamo, less powerful but more astute and, especially, more dynamic. When the jungle Indians go to missions it is difficult for them to conceive of a church or an image. 'These good people, said our missionary, 'like only outdoor processions. Recently when I celebrated the village's saint's day the Inirida Indians came to mass. They told me: Your god is locked into a house as if he was old and sick; our god is in the jungle, in fields, in the Sipapu mountains from where the rains come. In the larger, and thus more barbarous tribes, peculiar religious societies are formed. Some of the older Indians claim to be better initiated in divine matters and guard the famous botuto that they play under palm trees to make the fruit ripen. On the Orinoco banks no images or idols can be found, but the botuto, the sacred trumpet, is worshipped. To be initiated into the mysteries of the botuto you must be pure and celibate. The initiated are subject to flagellations, fasting and other disciplinarian practices. There are few sacred trumpets. The most famous is found on a hill at the confluence of the Tomo and Guainia rivers. It is said it can be heard at a distance of 10 leagues. Father Cerezo assured us that Indians talk of this botuto as the object of a cult common to several neighboring tribes. Fruit and alcoholic drinks are placed round this sacred trumpet. Sometimes the great spirit Cachimana himself blows the botuto, sometimes he speaks through whoever guards the instrument. As these tricks are very ancient (the fathers of our fathers, the Indians say) you should not be surprised that there are many believers. Women are not allowed to see the marvelous trumpet, and are excluded from all religious service. If one has the misfortune to see it she is mercilessly killed. The missionary told us that in 1798 he was lucky enough to save a young girl whom a jealous lover had accused of having followed the Indians who sounded the botuto. 'They would have murdered her publicly, said Father Cerezo. 'How could she have protected herself from Indian fanaticism, in a country where it is so easy to be poisoned? I sent her away to one of the missions on the Lower Orinoco.

If you compare the Río Negro with the Amazon, the River Plate or the Orinoco it is but a river of the second order. Possessing it has been, for centuries, of great political interest for the Spanish Government because it affords its rivals, the Portuguese, easy access into the Guianan missions to worry the Capitanía-General of Caracas in its southern limits. Three hundred years have passed in pointless territorial disputes. In different times, according to their degree of civilization, people have leaned either on papal authority or on astronomy. As they have generally been keener to prolong this dispute rather than solve it, only nautical science and geography have gained anything. When the affairs of Paraguay and the possession of the Sacramento colony became important for the two Courts of Madrid and Lisbon, commissioners were sent out to study the boundaries of the Orinoco, Amazon and River Plate. Besides the idle, who filled archives with their complaints and lawsuits, there were a few educated engineers and some naval officers acquainted with the means of determining the position of a place. The little we knew up to the of the last century about the geography of the interior of the Continent is due to these hard-working men. It is pleasing to remind ourselves that the sciences gained accidentally from these border commissions, often forgotten by the states that sent them out.

The Indian pilot led us across his garden, which seemed more a copse than cultivated land. As proof of the land's fertility he showed us a silk-cotton tree (Bombax heptaphyllum) whose trunk measured nearly 2. feet in diameter after only four years' growth. However, I think the Indian's estimate of the tree's age was somewhat exaggerated. Still on the Cumana beach, in the Guaiqueri's garden, we saw for the first time a guama (Inga spuria) loaded with flowers, remarkable for the length and silvery brilliance of their numerous stamen. We passed the neatly arranged streets of the Indian quarters, bordered with small new houses of attractive design This part of the town has just been rebuilt after the earthquake a year and a half before our arrival that destroyed Cumana. Hardly had we crossed the wooden bridge over the Manzanares river, full of bavas or small crocodiles, than we saw traces of that terrible catastrophe everywhere; new buildings rose over the ruins of the old.

In the time of the Jesuits the Maypures raudal mission was well known and had as many as 600 inhabitants including several families of whites. Under the government of the fathers of the Observance this has shrunk to some sixty. Those who still live there are mild and moderate, and very clean. Most of the wild Indians of the Orinoco are not excessively fond of strong alcohol like the North American Indian. It is true that Otomacs, Yaruros, Achaguas and Caribs often get drunk on chicha and other fermented drinks made from cassava, maize and sugared palm-tree fruit. But travelers, as usual, have generalized from the habits of a few villages. We often could not persuade the Guahibos who worked with us to drink brandy even when they seemed exhausted. (106)