60 WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA 



suaded to part with any of the wourali-poison, 

 though a good price was offered for it ; they gave 

 me to understand that it was powder and shot to 

 them, and very difficult to be procured. 



On the second day after leaving the settlement, 

 in passing along, the Indians show you a place 

 where once a white man lived. His retiring so far 

 from those of his own colour and acquaintance 

 seemed to carry something extraordinary along 

 with it, and raised a desire to know what could 

 have induced him to do so. It seems he had been 

 unsuccessful, and that his creditors had treated 

 him with as little mercy as the strong generally 

 show to the weak. Seeing his endeavours daily 

 frustrated, and his best intentions of no avail, and 

 fearing that when they had taken all he had they 

 would probably take his liberty too, he thought 

 the world would not be hard-hearted enough to 

 condemn him for retiring from the evils which 

 pressed so heavily on him, and which he had done 

 all that an honest man could do to ward off. He 

 left his creditors to talk of him as they thought fit, 

 and, bidding adieu forever to the place in which 

 he had once seen better times, he penetrated thus 

 far into those remote and gloomy wilds, and 

 ended his days here. 



According to the new map of South America, 

 Lake Parima, or the Wliite Sea, ought to be within 

 three or four days* walk from this place. On ask- 

 ing the Indians whether there was such a place or 

 not, and describing that the water was fresh and 

 good to drink, an old Indian, who appeared to be 

 about sixty, said that there was such a place, and 

 that he had been there. This information would 



