516 NOTES OF A BOTANIST CHAP. 



to follow the river-bank till you come to the canon 

 (on the map marked " Chushpi pongo "), up the right- 

 hand side of which you must climb the mountain, 

 "and in this manner thou canst by no means miss 

 thy way " ; which the map clearly shows, since it 

 leads up to the " Encanado," which is shown by the 

 other and more easy route to be the " way of the 



I 

 nca. 



I submit, therefore, that the "Guide" is equally 



minute and definite in its descriptions throughout, 



that it agrees everywhere with Guzman's map, and 



that, as it is admitted to be accurate in every detail 



for more than three-fourths of the whole distance, 



there is every probability that the last portion is 



equally accurate. It will, of course, be objected that, 



if so, why did not Guzman himself, who made the 



map, also complete the exploration of the route and 



make the discovery ? That, of course, we cannot 



tell ; but many reasons may be suggested as highly 



probable. Any such exploration of a completely 



uninhabited region must be very costly, and is 



always liable to fail near the end from lack of food, 



or from the desertion of the Indian porters when 



there was doubt about the route. Guzman had 



evidently been diverted from the search by what 



seemed the superior promise of silver and gold 



mines, from which he may have hoped to obtain 



wealth enough to carry out the other expedition 



with success. This failing, he apparently returned 



home, and may have been endeavouring to obtain 



recruits and funds for anew effort when his accidental 



death occurred. 



It is to be noted that beyond the point where the 

 hieroglyph puzzled all the early explorers there is a 



