26 MEMOIR OF 



properly developed, on learning of the enterprise, 

 were pleased to stamp it with their warm appro- 

 bation and extend to it their patronage; and Mr. 

 Schomburgk received the appointment, with orders 

 to proceed to Demerara, where he was to receive a 

 certain amount of funds, it being understood that 

 the sale of his zoological and botanical collections 

 were to contribute to defray the expenses incurred 

 during his voyage of discovery. * 



Nothing could have been more gratifying to the 

 feelings of this gentleman than such an appoint- 

 ment ; and he accepted the charge with alacrity, as 

 he clearly foresaw that it would enable him to be- 

 come acquainted with the interior of a fine country, 

 of which Europeans had hitherto obtained but a 

 very scanty knowledge, t 



Mr. Schomburgk left Georgetown on the 21st of 

 Sept. 1835, and, coasting round the peninsula of low 

 alluvial land, reached the entrance of the Essequibo, 

 which discharges itself into the sea by an outlet 

 nearly twenty miles widej. from shore to shore, but 

 separated into four channels, of which the chief, 

 called Wakenaam, is seven miles in length. 



* The instructions which were sent out are printed in the 

 Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, vol. vi. 

 page 7. 



f Mr. Schomburgk has been so kind as to make the follow- 

 ing extracts, detailing the principal facts of the Gu'ana expe- 

 dition, expressly for our use. — Ed. 



J According to others, only fifteen. 



