On the right bank of the Orinoco, south-east of the Encaramada mission, 100 leagues from the Chaimas, live the Tamanacos. Despite the distance and numerous local obstacles it is clear that Chaima is a branch of Tamanaco. I discovered the link between these languages years after my return to Europe when I compared data collected in a grammar book of an old missionary on the Orinoco, printed in Italy. (62)

The bones are prepared in three different ways; they are whitened, or colored red with annatto, a dye from Bixa orellana, or varnished with a scented resin and wrapped like mummies in banana leaves. Indians insisted that as soon as somebody died the corpse was left for months in damp earth so that the flesh rotted away; then it was dug up and the remains of the flesh scraped off with a sharp stone. Some tribes in Guiana still practice this method. Next to the baskets or mapires we also found half-baked clay urns with the remains of whole families. The largest urns are almost 3 feet high and 5. feet wide. They are greenish, and of a pleasing oval shape. Some have crocodiles and snakes drawn on them. The top edges are decorated with meanders and labyrinths. These are very similar to the decorations covering the walls of the Mexican palace at Mitla; they are found everywhere, even among the Greeks and Romans, as on the shields of the Tahitians and other Pacific Islanders.

On the 14th of September we descended the Cocollar towards the San Antonio mission. The road passes at first through savannahs strewn with huge calcareous blocks, and then enters a thick jungle. Having crossed two steep passes we saw before us a pretty valley, some 5 to 6 leagues long from east to west. Here lie the San Antonio and Guanaguana missions. The first is famous for its little brick church, with two towers and Doric columns, in a tolerable style. The prefect of the Capuchins finished building it in less than two summers, despite using only Indians from his village. The moulding of the capitals on the columns, the cornices and the frieze, decorated with suns and arabesques, were all modeled from clay mixed with ground brick. The provincial governor disapproved of such luxury in a mission and the church remained unfinished, much to the regret of the fathers. The Indians in San Antonio did not complain at all, indeed they secretly approved the governor's decision, as it favored their natural laziness.

May 10th. Overnight our canoe was loaded and we set off a little before dawn to go up the Río Negro to the mouth of the Casiquiare and begin our researches on the true course of this river linking the Orinoco and Amazon. The morning was beautiful, but as the heat rose the sky began to cloud over. The air is so saturated with water in these forests that water bubbles become visible at the slightest increase of evaporation on the earth's surface. As there is no breeze the humid strata are not replaced and renewed by drier air. This clouded sky made us gloomier and gloomier. Through this humidity Bonpland -lost the plants he had collected; for my part I feared finding the same Río Negro mists in the Casiquiare valley. For more than half a century nobody in the missions has doubted the existence of communications between the two great river systems: the important aim of our journey was reduced to fixing the course of the Casiquiare by astronomic means, especially at its point of entry into the Río Negro, and its bifurcation with the Orinoco. Without sun or stars this aim would have been frustrated, and we would have been uselessly exposed to long, weary deprivation. Our travelling companions wanted to return by the shortest journey, along the Pimichín and its small rivers; but Bonpland preferred, like myself, to persist in the original plan we had traced out while crossing the Great Cataracts. We had already traveled by canoe from San Fernando de Apure to San Carlos along the Apure, Orinoco, Atabapo, Temi, Tuamini and Río Negro for over 180 leagues. In entering the Orinoco by the Casiquiare we still had some 320 leagues to cover from San Carlos to Angostura. It would have been a shame to let ourselves be discouraged by the fear of a cloudy sky and the Casiquiare mosquitoes. Our Indian pilot, who had recently visited Mandavaca, promised us sun and 'those great stars that eat up clouds' once we had left the black waters of the Guaviare. So we managed to carry out our first plan and returned to San Fernando along the Casiquiare. Luckily for our researches the Indian's prediction was fulfilled. The white waters brought us a clear sky, stars, mosquitoes and crocodiles.

Our host had visited the New World with an expedition that was set up to fell wood for the Spanish navy on the Paria Gulf shore. In the vast jungle of mahogany, cedar and Brazil-wood that borders the Caribbean Sea they wanted to select the largest trees, shape them in a rough way for the building of ships, and send them every year to the dockyard at Càdiz. White, unacclimatized men could not support the hard work, the heat, or the effect of the noxious air from the jungle. The same winds that are loaded with the perfume of flowers, leaves and wood also bring, so to speak, the germs of disease into our organs. Destructive fevers carried off not only the ship carpenter but also those who managed the business; so this bay, which the early Spaniards called Golfo Triste on account of the gloomy and wild aspect of its coasts, became the graveyard of European seamen.

Travelers know by experience that views from the summits of high mountains are neither as beautiful, picturesque, nor as varied as those from the heights of Vesuvius, Righi or the Poy-de-Dôme. Colossal mountains such as Chimborazo, Antisana or Monte Rosa compose such a huge mass that the richly cultivated plains are seen only at a great distance where a bluish and watery tint spreads over the landscape. The Tenerife peak, due to its narrow shape and local position, combines the advantages of the less high summits with those of the very high. From its top we can see not only the sea to the horizon, but also the forests of Tenerife and the inhabited coastal strips, which seem so close that their shapes and tones stand out in beautiful contrasts. It could be said that the volcano crushes the little island that serves as its base, and that it shoots up from the depths of the seas to a height three times higher than cloud level in summer.