NATURAL FEATURES OF VENEZUELA. 51^ 



ing to Venezuela, is the seat of a pearl industry that was once 

 important but has seriously declined. Its fisheries are flourishing, 

 but these, together with the scant agricultural resources of the 

 island, do not suffice to support the native population, which in- 

 creases rapidly. Consequently, large numbers of the men emi- 

 grate to the mainland. The climate of the island is salubrious 

 and attracts consumptive patients from great distances. An ex- 

 cellent quality of salt is produced on all these islands and along 

 the coast of the mainland. From a lichen growing on the rocks 

 of Orchilla is extracted the violet dye of that name. 



While in the United States the Indians are an almost unre- 

 garded remnant, the aborigines of Venezuela form a large element 

 of the less than two and a half million population. The pure 

 whites, mainly of Spanish origin, but including immigrants from 

 the chief trading countries, are less than two per cent of the 

 whole. The pure aborigines are estimated at about one seventh, 

 and there are some negroes, as African slavery existed here up to 

 1854. Parts of these races have intermingled in various ways, 

 producing mestizoes, mulattoes, zambos, and mixtures of other de- 

 grees. Four fifths of the full-blooded Indians are classed as civil- 

 ized, and are engaged in agriculture, or as laborers in the other 

 occupations carried on by the whites. 



The climate of difi'erent parts of Venezuela varies greatly with 

 elevation, aspect, and soil. The highlands are in the main tem- 

 perate and salubrious, while the low parts of the coast, the lands 

 about Lake Maracaibo, the delta of the Orinoco, and parts of the 

 plains are among the hottest regions in South America. During 

 the rainy season, from April to October, many of these low lands 

 are flooded, giving rise to swamp fevers and dysentery. The coun- 

 try does not suffer so much from yellow fever as might be expected. 



The downpour of the rainy season is drained away by over a 

 thousand rivers, many of which become dry or dwindle to chains 

 of lagoons in the dry months. The Orinoco is the great artery of 

 the country and is destined to become of vast importance as a 

 channel of traffic when the region through which it flows is more 

 thickly settled. Steamers enter it from the sea by seven of its 

 fifty mouths, and run to Bolivar, three hundred and sixty miles 

 up the river. Smaller steamboats can ascend as far as the Atures 

 rapids, nearly a thousand miles. Its chief branch, the Apure, 

 gives access to a region far west of the main stream, and, as some 

 four hundred of its other affluents are said to be navigable, it will 

 be seen that a vast extent of country is reached by the Orinoco 

 system. In this respect, which is the true measure of a river's 

 importance, the Orinoco ranks fifth on the American continent, 

 or fourth, if we disregard the artificial helps with which the St. 

 Lawrence has been provided. Just below the great bend of the 



