48 N At URAL HIS TORT 



whether the rain that accompanies the norths among the iflands, 

 efpecially thofe mofl remote from the Hne, be not generally in 

 a greater proportion than is commonly fuppofed. 



Country. — I will now endeavour to give you fome idea of 

 the face of the country. Though, as is well known, Guiana 

 is flat and fwampy, yet it affords to the attentive eye an in- 

 terefting variety. The fea-coaft is little, if at all, raifed above 

 the level of high water, and it continues at this level for many 

 miles inland. It is properly an immenfe woody fwamp, never 

 dry in the dried feafon, covered with feveral feet of water in 

 the wet. Next the fhore, as far as the brackiflx water extends, it 

 is covered with mangroves, which grow to a conliderable height, 

 and form a thick fhade. They are elevated on their branchy 

 intermingled roots from the bare v/et clay or mud, on which 

 there is fcarcely one herb or plant, bvit which feems to be all in 

 motion, from the prodigious number of crabs which make- 

 their holes in it. Further on, when the under-water is frefh, 

 you meet with a new fet of vegetables, principally fmall 

 trees, which, from their fituation, are obliged to adopt the 

 habits of mangroves, having the bottom of their trunks fup- 

 ported three or four feet above ground by their ramified 

 I'oots. Several climbing plants are . mixed with them. Arunis, 

 in great variety and profufion, emerge from the water, or 

 embrace the ftems of the trees ; and feveral broad-leafed plants 

 of the hexandria and triandria clafl'es, aflifl the Arunis in 

 forming an herbage. In all this low part of Demerary, there 

 is not one tree of a large fize, nor 'among them all above 

 two or three fpecies which can be applied to ufe as timber. 

 Proceeding ftill up the river, its banks are found generally to 

 raife then^felves above the level of the water ; and when you 

 have gone up one tide, (betwixt twenty and thirty miles), they 

 are fo high, that there is no farther occafion for dams to keep 

 the plantations from being overflowed at high water, as below ; 

 I canals 



