228 A VOYAGE TO Book V. 



a&trononfvical observations. For, in the deserts, the 

 clouds in which vvc were so frequently involved hin- 

 dered us from discerning the other signals; and in 

 the city, over which they spread a kind of perpetual 

 pavilion, they hid the stars from t/s while they passed 

 the meridian; but patience and resolution, inspired by 

 the importance of our enterprise, having enabled ns 

 at last to perform our task on the south side of the 

 equator^ we prepared for cur journey to the north of 

 it, in order to make the astronomical observations at 

 the other extremity of t!^e arch of the meridian, and 

 thus put the finishing hand to our vvork: but this was 

 for some time retarded by an accident of importance 

 which called us to Lima, as will be related in the se- 

 cond volume. 



In December 1743, the reasons which detained us 

 at Lima, Guayaquil, and in Chili, no longer subsist- 

 ing, we returned to Quito in January 1744, when 

 Don George Juan and I prolonged the arch of the 

 meridian four triangles, by which it was extended 

 to the place where M. Godin, in 1740, had made 

 the second astronomical observation, and whicji 

 he now^ repeated, and finished in the month of May 



1744. 



Mess. Bouguer. and M. de la Condamine havino' 

 at that time finished the several parts assigned to thcm^ 

 had left Quito, in order to return to France ; the 

 former by the way of Carthagena, and the latter by 

 the river of the Amazons ; but the rest of the com- 

 pany remained there some time ; some for fear of be- 

 ing taken by the enemy, some for vi'ant of the means 

 to defray the charges necessary in so lon'g a journey, 

 and others on account of thcirhaving contractedsome 

 obligations, and were unwilling to leave the country 

 till they could discharge them. So thai in the former 

 only the natural desire of returning \o their country 

 prevailed, in order there to repose themselves after 

 such a series of labours and hardships, by whicJi the 

 2 health 



