I stayed in the San Antonio mission long enough to open the barometer and take some measurements of the sun's altitude. The great square lies 216 toises above Cumanà. Beyond the village we crossed the Colorado and Guarapiche rivers, both of which rise in the Cocollar mountains and meet lower down in the east. The Colorado has a very fast current and its mouth is wider than the Rhine; the Guarapiche, joining the Areo river, is more than 25 fathoms deep. On their banks grow a beautiful grass (lata a caìa brava), which I drew (55) two years later as I ascended the Magdalena river, whose silver-leafed stalks reach 15 to 20 feet. Our mules could hardly move through the thick mud along the narrow and flat road. Torrents of rain fell from the sky and turned the jungle into a swamp.

This hope was not totally justified. The youngest passenger attacked by the malignant fever was unluckily the only victim. He was a nineteen-year-old Asturian, the only son of a widow without means. Several circumstances made the death of this sensitive and mild-tempered youth moving. He had embarked against his will; his mother, whom he hoped to help through his work, had sacrificed her tenderness and own interests in order to assure the fortune of her son in the colonies, helping a rich cousin in Cuba. The luckless youth had fallen from the start into a total lethargy, with moments of delirium, and died on the third day. Yellow fever, or black vomit as it is called at Veracruz, does not carry off the sick so frighteningly quickly. Another Asturian, even younger than he, never left his bedside and, more remarkably, never caught the illness. He was following his compatriot to Cuba, to be introduced into his relation's house, on whom they had based all their hopes. It was desperate to see this young man abandon himself to deep grief and curse the advice of those who had sent him to a distant land, alone and without support.

On the 12th we continued our journey to the Caripe monastery, center of the Chaima Indian missions. Instead of the direct road, we chose the one that passes by the Cocollar (54) and Turimiquiri mountains. We passed the little Indian village of Aricagua, pleasantly located in wooded hills. From there we climbed up hill for four hours. This part of the route is very tiring; we crossed the Pututucuar, whose river bed is packed with blocks of calcareous rock, twenty-two times. When we had reached the Cuesta del Cocollar, some 2, feet above sea-level, we saw, to our surprise, that the jungle of tall trees had vanished. Then we crossed an immense plain covered in grass. 0nly mimosas, with hemispheric tops and trunks some 4 to 5 feet in diameter, break the desolate monotony of the savannahs. Their branches are bent towards the ground, or spread out like parasols.

The brink of the crater does not resemble any of the other volcanoes I have visited, such as Vesuvius, Jorullo or Pichincha. On the peak the wall, which surrounds the crater like a parapet, is so high that it would not let you reach La Caldera were it not for a breach on the eastern side caused by a very ancient lava overflow. We climbed down through this gap to the bottom of the elliptical funnel.

It was fascinating to see guacamayos, or tame macaws, flying around the Indian huts as we see pigeons in Europe. This bird is the largest and most majestic of the parrot species. Including its tail it measures 2 feet 3 inches. The flesh, which is often eaten, is black and rather tough. These macaws, whose feathers shine with tints of purple, blue and yellow, are a grand ornament in Indian yards, and are just as beautiful as the peacock or golden pheasant. Rearing parrots was noticed by Columbus when he first discovered America.