The natural beauties of the mountains absorbed us so completely that we did not notice we were becoming a weight on our good and hospitable padres. Their provisions of wine and wheat bread were small, and both are considered real luxuries in these lands, so it inhibited us to think that our hosts deprived themselves on our account. Our ration of bread had been reduced to one quarter, yet the cruel rains delayed our departure for two days. How long that delay seemed; we dreaded the bell that called us for a meal!

May 1st. The Indians wanted to leave long before sunrise. We got up before them because we had hoped to see some stars, but in this humid, thick-jungled zone the nights were getting darker and darker as we approached the Río Negro and the interior of Brazil. We stayed in the river until dawn, fearing to get lost in the trees. But as soon as the sun rose we went through the flooded jungle to avoid the strong current. We reached the confluence of the Temi and Tuamini and went upstream on the latter south-west, reaching the Javita mission on the banks of the Tuamini at about eleven in the morning. It was at this Christian mission that we hoped to find help in carrying our pirogue to the Río Negro. A minor accident shows how fearful the little sagouin monkeys are. The noise of the 'blowers' seared one of them and it fell into the water. These monkeys can hardly swim, and we just managed to save it.

Nothing equals the beauty and mildness of a tropical ocean's climate. While the trade wind blew strongly the thermometer remained steadily at 23'C or 24'C by day, and 22'C to 22. by night. What a contrast between the tempestuous seas of the northern latitudes and those regions where the peace of nature is never disturbed! If the return journey from Mexico or South America was as quick and agreeable as the outgoing one the number of Europeans settled in the colonies would be considerably less than it is at the present. The seas that surround the Azores and Bermudas, which you cross when returning to Europe, are oddly called by Spaniards El Golfo de las Yeguas (Gulf of Mares). Settlers who are not used to the sea and who have lived isolatedly in Guianan forests, or in the savannahs of Caracas, or in the mountains of Peru, fear this gulf more than people fear Cape Horn. They exaggerate the dangers of a journey that is treacherous only in winter. They postpone this dangerous return year after year until death surprises them still planning.

April 3rd. Since leaving San Fernando we had not met one boat on the beautiful river. Everything suggested the most profound solitude. In the morning the Indians had caught with a hook the fish called caribe or caribito locally as no other fish is more avid for blood. (93) It attacks bathers and swimmers by biting large chunks of flesh out of them. When one is slightly wounded it is difficult to leave the water without getting more wounds. Indians are terrified of the caribe fish and several showed us wounds on their calfs and thighs, deep scars made by these little fish that the Maypure call umati. They live at the bottom of rivers, but as soon as a few drops of blood are spilled in the water they reach the surface in their thousands. When you consider the numbers of these fish, of which the most voracious and cruel are but 4 to 5 inches long, the triangular shape of their sharp, cutting teeth, and the width of their retractile mouths you cannot doubt the fear that the caribe inspires in the river inhabitants. In places on the river when the water was clear and no fish could be seen we threw bits of bloodied meat in, and within minutes a cloud of caribes came to fight for their food. I described and drew this fish on the spot. The caribito has a very agreeable taste. As one does not dare bathe when it is around you can regard it as the greatest scourge of this climate where mosquito bites and skin irritation make a bath so necessary.

Our first excursion to the Araya peninsula was followed by another more important and instructive one to the mountain missions of the Chaima Indians. Such a variety of objects attracted our attention. We found ourselves in a country bristling with forests on our way to visit a convent shaded by palm trees and arborescent ferns in a narrow valley which was deliciously fresh, despite being in the middle of the torrid zone. In the surrounding mountains there are eaves inhabited by thousands of nocturnal birds; and, what struck our imagination more than all the marvels of the physical world, even further up we found a people until recently still nomadic, hardly free from a natural, wild state, but not barbarians, made stupid more from ignorance than from long years of being brutalized. What we knew about history increased our interest in these people. The promontory of Paria was what Columbus first saw of this continent; these valleys ended there, devastated first by the warlike, cannibalistic Caribs, then by the mercantile and orderly European nations. If the Spaniards visited these shores it was only to get, either by violence or exchange, slaves, pearls, gold and dye-woods; they tried to dignify their motives for such an insatiable greed with the pretence of religious zeal.