DUG-OUTS 169 



myself, belonged to the last division. The Indians, Isidor, 

 Maite, and Vicente, were in the first. The Venezuelan 

 contingent was the borderland of these extremes. Its 

 constituents affected a compromise in rags, and this 

 assisted in toning down to a certain extent the strong 

 contrast between the Indians and ourselves. This general 

 introduction will, I trust, serve to convey some sort of 

 idea of the living material of which the expedition was 

 composed. 



The pilots of the large boats were the three Indians, 

 Isidor, Maite, and Vicente. Luis Urbana, whom we 

 had christened * the Pirate ' on account of his villainous 

 expression and the old red handkerchief he was in the 

 habit of tying around his head, was in charge of the 

 medium-sized boat. Pancho Montenegro and the Indian 

 woman from the Eio Negro managed Medina's small 

 curiara, which carried the cooking utensils, and the 

 bananas, yams, and sweet potatoes for the journey. All 

 the traffic on the tributaries of the Orinoco, and on the 

 upper reaches of the main stream, which do not allow 

 of steam communication, or where the trade is too insig- 

 nificant for the employment of steamers, is conducted by 

 dug-outs. These dug-outs are of all sizes, from the small 

 narrow canoe barely twelve feet long, that requires an 

 education like that of a rope dancer before one can 

 venture to travel with anything like safety in it, to the 

 lumbering bongo of several tons burden, which will carry 

 a whole family with comfort. All over Venezuela these 

 dug-outs are called curiaras ; the larger ones are known 

 as bongos. Some of the largest dug-outs I have seen are 

 used at Buenaventura on the Pacific coast of Colombia. 

 The shipping and loading of passengers and cargo to and 

 from the steamers calling at this port are done almost 



