ILLUSTRATIONS (9). LAKE PABIME. 183 



Pacaraima Mountains, the two villages of Santa Rosa and 

 San Bautista de Caudacacla. The former was situate on 

 the upper eastern bank of the Uraricapara, a tributary of 

 the Uraricuera, which I find in the journal of Rodriguez under 

 the name of the Rio Curaricara; the latter, at from 24 to 28 

 miles further east-south-east. The astronomo-geographer of 

 the Portuguese Boundary Commission, Captain Don Antonio 

 Pires de Svlva Pontes Leme, and the Captain of Engineers, Don 

 Ricardo Franco cV Almeida de Serra, who between 1787 and 

 1804, surveyed with the greatest care the whole course of the 

 Rio Branco and its upper tributaries, call the most western 

 part of the Uraricapara, "The Valley of Inundation." They 

 place the Spanish mission of Santa Rosa in 3 46' north lat., 

 and mark the route that leads from thence northward across 

 the mountain chain to the Caiio Anocapra, a branch of the 

 Paraguamusi, which forms a connecting passage between the 

 basin of the Rio Branco and that of the Caroni. Two maps 

 of these Portuguese officers, embracing all the details of the 

 trigometrical survey of the bends of the Rio Branco, the 

 Uraricuera, the Tacutu, and the Mahu, were most kindly 

 communicated to Colonel Lapie and myself by the Count of 

 Linhares. These valuable unpublished documents, of which 

 I have availed myself, are still in the hands of the learned 

 geographer, who long since began to have them engraved at 

 his own expense. The Portuguese sometimes call the whole 

 of the Rio Branco by the name of Rio Parime, and sometimes 

 limit this appellation to one branch only, the Uraricuera, some- 

 what below the Cano Mayari and above the old mission of San 

 Antonio. As the words Paragua and Parime alike imply water, 

 great water, lake, and sea, we cannot wonder at finding them, 

 so often repeated among tribes living at great distances 

 from each other; as, for instance, by the Omaguas on the 

 Upper Maranon, by the Western Guaranis, and by the 

 Caribs. In all parts of the world, as I have already re- 

 marked, large rivers are called by those who live on 

 their banks * the River," without any specific denomination. 

 Paragua, the name of a branch of the Caroni, is also the term 

 applied by the natives to the Upper Orinoco. The name 

 Orinucu is Tamanakish; and Diego de Ordaz first heard it 

 used in the year 1531, when he ascended to the mouth of the 

 Meta. Besides the Valley of Inundation above mentioned 



