WHOLE VOL. THE WEST INDIES VAZQUEZ DE ESPINOSA lOI 



forms a sort of whipped cream, and they make excellent rice pudding 

 with it, and other delicious dishes; whoever sees or tastes it would 

 take it for natural cow's milk. 



284. A river runs down from these mines, navigable in canoes as 

 far as La Borburata, and very rich in fish ; they catch great quantities 

 of fish in it, as well as in other rivers of this State, with nets made 

 of the leaves of a cane, which they call cogollo (shoot) ; these they 

 put into pools ; they grind up the root of the plant "barbasco" and 

 throw it into the streams at noon under the blazing sun, and it poisons 

 the fish so that they float bottom up ; thus they catch great quantities 

 of them, with which they provide all the country inland. 



285. There are in these provinces and this State, as in many 

 tropical regions in the Indies, many honeycombs in the woods; the 

 bees build them in the trees whose flowers they exploit, and particu- 

 larly the jobo or jocote tree, like our Michaelmas plums. There is a 

 very tall tree like a walnut, which they call mijagua; it bears fruit 

 resembling dried plums, but larger and sweeter, and delicious fruit 

 for invalids. 



286. There are wild walnuts loaded down with small thick-shelled 

 nuts and whole woods of wild apples of the same sort as ours ; the 

 trees that bear them are much larger than our apple trees, with leaves 

 like laurel leaves ; the apples taste somewhat sourer than ours, but 

 that is due to their not being cultivated. They have many spice trees — 

 liquidambar, canime, and balsam — which diffuse much fragrance ; 

 benzoin, dragon's blood and other medicinal extracts, gums, and 

 fruits. 



287. There is such a variety of animals and birds that one cannot 

 possibly enumerate them. Back of these provinces and this State, in 

 the plains to the S., between Caranaca, which is called El Dorado, and 

 the New Kingdom of Granada, there are extensive heathen Indian 

 tribes called Guamonteyes and other tribes, who could easily be con- 

 verted to the Faith. Whenever the Spaniards enter that country on 

 some expedition, they serve and aid them with great humility, and 

 without treachery, for they are simple, naked people, without malice. 



288. This Diocese is bounded on the W. by that of Santa Marta 

 and on the WSW. by the Archdiocese of Santa Fe de Bogota of the 

 New Kingdom of Granada at the city of Merida ; on the S. by heathen 

 Indians, and on the E. by the State of Nueva Andalucia and Cumana. 

 which is at present within the Diocese of Puerto Rico ; and although 

 Caracas is on the Spanish Main, since it falls within the Secretariat 

 of New Spain and is suffragan to Santo Domingo, I have put it at this 

 point in the description. 



