However, this luxuriant vegetation does not only embellish the outer vault but also reaches into the vestibule of the grotto. We saw, to our surprise, that superb heliconias 18 feet tall, with banana-tree type leaves, praga palms and arborescent arums bordered the rivulet's banks right into the cave. Vegetation penetrates inside the Caripe cave some thirty to forty paces. We measured the way in by means of a cord, and went about 430 feet without needing to light torches. Daylight reaches this place because the cave forms one single gallery that stretches south-east to north-west. In the spot where light begins to fail we heard the hoarse screams of the nocturnal birds that, according to the Indians, live only in these underground caves.

After dividing all that belongs to astronomy, botany, zoology, the political description of New Spain, and the history of the ancient civilizations of certain New World nations into separate works, many general results and local descriptions remained left over, which I could still collect into separate treatises. I had prepared several during my journey; on races in South America; on the Orinoco missions; on what hinders civilization in the torrid zone, from the climate to the vegetation; the landscape of the Andes compared to the Swiss Alps; analogies between the rocks of the two continents; the air in the equinoctial regions, etc. I had left Europe with the firm decision not to write what is usually called the historical narrative of a journey, but just to publish the results of my researches. I had arranged the facts not as they presented themselves individually but in their relationships to each other. Surrounded by such powerful nature, and all the things seen every day, the traveler feels no inclination to record in a journal all the ordinary details of life that happen to him.

The Indians we found at San Francisco Solano belong to two different tribes: the Pacimonales and the Cheruvichanenas. The latter came from a prestigious tribe living on the Tomo river, near the Manivas of the Upper Guiana, so I tried to find out from them about the upper course of the Río Negro, and where I could find its sources; but my interpreter could not make them understand the true sense of my question. They just repeated over and over again that the sources of the Río Negro and the Inirida were as close together as two fingers on a hand'. In one of the Pacimonales's huts we bought two great, beautiful birds: a toucan (piapoco), similar to the Ramphastos erythrorynchos, and an ana, a kind of macaw, with purple feathers like the Psittacus macao. In our canoe we already had seven parrots, two cock-of-the-rocks (pipra), a motmot, two guans or pavas del monte, two manaviris (cercoleptes or Viverra caudivolvula), and eight monkeys, of which three were new species. Father Zea was not too happy about the rate our zoological collection increased day by day, although he kept that to himself. The toucan resembles the raven in its habits and intelligence; it is a brave creature and easy to tame. Its long, strong beak serves as its defense. It becomes master of the house; steals whatever it can, frequently takes a bath, and likes fishing on the river bank. The one we bought was very young, yet throughout our journey it took malicious delight in molesting the sad, irritable monkeys. The structure of the toucan's beak does not oblige it to swallow food by throwing it into the air as some naturalists claim. It is true that it does have problems lifting food from the ground, but once food is seized in its long beak it throws back its head so that it swallows perpendicularly. When this bird wants to drink it makes an odd gesture; monks say it makes the sign of the cross over the water. Because of this creoles have baptized the toucan with the strange name of Diostedé (May God give it to you).

Sometimes, and it's the only accident the Indians fear, the canoes break against rocks. Then, their bodies bloodied, the Indians try to escape the whirlpools and swim ashore. In those places where the rocks are very high, or the embankment they are going up crosses the whole river, they roll the boat up on tree trunks.

We waited nearly the whole day in the miserable village of Mahates for the animals carrying our belongings to the landing-stage on the Magdalena river. It was suffocatingly hot; at this time of year there is not a breath of wind. Feeling depressed we lay on the ground in the main square. My barometer had broken and it was the last one I had. I had anticipated measuring the slope of the river and fixing the speed of its current and the position of different stages through astronomical observations. Only travelers know how painful it is to suffer such accidents, which continued to dog me in the Andes and in Mexico; each time this happened I felt the same. Of all the instruments a traveler should carry the barometer is the one, despite all its imperfections, that caused me the most worry and whose loss I felt the most. Only chronometers, which sometimes suddenly and unpredictably change their rates, give rise to the same sense of loss. Indeed, after travelling thousands of leagues over land with astronomical and physical instruments, you are tempted to cry out: 'Lucky are those who travel without instruments that break, without dried plants that get wet, without animal collections that rot; lucky are those who travel the world to see it with their own eyes, trying to understand it, and recollecting the sweet emotions that nature inspires!

It was already dark when we crossed the Orinoco bed for the last time. We meant to spend the night near the small San Rafael fort and begin the journey across the Venezuelan steppes at dawn. Nearly six weeks had passed since our arrival at Angostura, we dearly wanted to reach the Cumanà or Nueva Barcelona coasts to find a boat to take us to Cuba and then on to Mexico. After several months on mosquito-infested rivers in small canoes, a long sea journey excited our imaginations.