204 CHEAr LANTEIINS. 



in its intensity at the will of tlie animal by wliicli it was 

 produced. It seemed as though the starry firmament 

 reposed on the savannah. In the hut of the poorest in- 

 habitants of the countrj^, fifteen of these insects, placed 

 in a calabash pierced with holes, afforded sufficient light 

 to search for anything during the night. To shake the 

 calabash forcibly was all that was necessary to excite the 

 animal to increase the intensity of the luminous discs 

 situated on each side of its body. Tlie people of the 

 country remarked, that calabashes filled with these phos- 

 phorescent insects were lanterns always ready lighted. 

 They were, in fact, only extinguished by the sickness or 

 death of the insects, which were easily fed with a little 

 sugar-cane. A young woman at Trinidad de Cuba told 

 the travellers, that during a long and difficult passage 

 from the main land, she always made use of their phos- 

 phorescence when she gave suck to her child at night ; 

 the captain of the ship would allow no other light on 

 board, from the fear of corsairs. 



The travellers quitted Trinidad on the night of the 

 15th. The municipality caused them to be conducted tc 

 the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo in a fine carriage lined 

 with old crimson damask ; and, to add to their confusion, 

 an ecclesiastic, the poet of the place, habited in a suit of 

 velvet notwithstanding the heat of the climate, cele- 

 brated, in a sonnet, their voyage to the Orinoco. 



On the morning of the 17th they came within sight of the 

 most eastern island of the group of the Lesser Caymans. 



As long as they were within sight of this island, sea- 

 turtles of extraordinary dimensions swam round their 

 vessel. The abundance of these animals led Columbus 

 to give the whole group of the Caymans the name of 



