We Landed Here And There, To Climb Upon The Rocks, Which Like Narrow Dikes Joined The Islands To One Another.

Sometimes the waters force their way over the dikes, sometimes they fall within them with a hollow noise.

A considerable portion of the Orinoco was dry, because the river had found an issue by subterraneous caverns. In these solitary haunts the rock-manakin with gilded plumage (Pipra rupicola), one of the most beautiful birds of the tropics, builds its nest. The Raudalito of Carucari is caused by an accumulation of enormous blocks of granite, several of which are spheroids of five or six feet in diameter, and they are piled together in such a manner, as to form spacious caverns. We entered one of these caverns to gather the confervas that were spread over the clefts and humid sides of the rock. This spot displayed one of the most extraordinary scenes of nature that we had contemplated on the banks of the Orinoco. The river rolled its waters turbulently over our heads. It seemed like the sea dashing against reefs of rocks; but at the entrance of the cavern we could remain dry beneath a large sheet of water that precipitated itself in an arch from above the barrier. In other cavities, deeper, but less spacious, the rock was pierced by the effect of successive filtrations. We saw columns of water, eight or nine inches broad, descending from the top of the vault, and finding an issue by clefts, that seemed to communicate at great distances with each other.

The cascades of Europe, forming only one fall, or several falls close to each other, can never produce such variety in the shifting landscape. This variety is peculiar to rapids, to a succession of small cataracts several miles in length, to rivers that force their way across rocky dikes and accumulated blocks of granite. We had the opportunity of viewing this extraordinary sight longer than we wished. Our boat was to coast the eastern bank of a narrow island, and to take us in again after a long circuit. We passed an hour and a half in vain expectation of it. Night approached, and with it a tremendous storm. It rained with violence. We began to fear that our frail bark had been wrecked against the rocks, and that the Indians, conformably to their habitual indifference for the evils of others, had returned tranquilly to the mission. There were only three of us: we were completely wet, and uneasy respecting the fate of our boat: it appeared far from agreeable to pass, without sleep, a long night of the torrid zone amid the noise of the Raudales. M. Bonpland proposed to leave me in the island with Don Nicolas Soto, and to swim across the branches of the river that are separated by the granitic dikes. He hoped to reach the forest, and seek assistance at Atures from Father Zea. We dissuaded him with difficulty from undertaking this hazardous enterprise. He knew little of the labyrinth of small channels, into which the Orinoco is divided. Most of them have strong whirlpools, and what passed before our eyes while we were deliberating on our situation, proved sufficiently that the natives had deceived us respecting the absence of crocodiles in the cataracts. The little monkeys which we had carried along with us for months were deposited on the point of our island. Wet by the rains and sensible of the least lowering of the temperature, these delicate animals sent forth plaintive cries, and attracted to the spot two crocodiles, the size and leaden colour of which denoted their great age. Their unexpected appearance made us reflect on the danger we had incurred by bathing, at our first passing by the mission of Atures, in the middle of the Raudal. After long waiting, the Indians at length arrived at the close of day. The natural coffer-dam by which they had endeavoured to descend in order to make the circuit of the island, had become impassable owing to the shallowness of the water. The pilot sought long for a more accessible passage in this labyrinth of rocks and islands. Happily our canoe was not damaged and in less than half an hour our instruments, provision, and animals, were embarked.

We pursued our course during a part of the night, to pitch our tent again in the island of Panumana. We recognized with pleasure the spots where we had botanized when going up the Orinoco. We examined once more on the beach of Guachaco that small formation of sandstone, which reposes directly on granite. Its position is the same as that of the sandstone which Burckhardt observed at the entrance of Nubia, superimposed on the granite of Syene. We passed, without visiting it, the new mission of San Borga, where (as we learned with regret a few days after) the little colony of Guahibos had fled al monte, from the chimerical fear that we should carry them off; to sell them as poitos, or slaves. After having passed the rapids of Tabaje, and the Raudal of Cariven, near the mouth of the great Rio Meta, we arrived without accident at Carichana. The missionary received us with that kind hospitality which he extended to us on our first passage. The sky was unfavourable for astronomical observations; we had obtained some new ones in the two Great Cataracts; but thence, as far as the mouth of the Apure, we were obliged to renounce the attempt. M. Bonpland had the satisfaction at Carichana of dissecting a manatee more than nine feet long. It was a female, and the flesh appeared to us not unsavoury. I have spoken in another place of the manner of catching this herbivorous cetacea. The Piraoas, some families of whom inhabit the mission of Carichana, detest this animal to such a degree, that they hid themselves, to avoid being obliged to touch it, whilst it was being conveyed to our hut. They said that the people of their tribe die infallibly when they eat of it.

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