CHAPTEE XII. 



THE SAVANNA OF ARIPO. 



The last of my pleasant rides, and one which would have 

 been perhaps the pleasantest of all, had I had (as on other 

 occasions) the company of my host, was to the Cocal, or 

 Coco-palm grove, of the east coast, taking on my way the 

 Savanna of Aripo. It had been our wish to go up the 

 Oroonoco, as far as Ciudad Bolivar (the Angostura of Hum- 

 boldt's travels), to see the new capital of Southern Venezuela, 

 fast rising into wealth and importance under the wise and 

 pacific policy of its president, Sehor Dalla Costa, a man 

 said to possess a genius and an integrity far superior to the 

 average of South American republicans of which latter the 

 less said the better; to push back, if possible, across those 

 Llanos which Humboldt describes in his " Personal Narra- 

 tive," vol iv. p. 295 ; it may be to visit the Palls of the 

 Caroni. But that had to be done by others, after we were 

 gone. My days in the island were growing short; and the 



