196 CATARACTS OP THE ORINOCO, 



remark, that for a century past no advance has taken place in our 

 geographical knowledge of the country west of this valley between 

 61 1 and 65 J W. longitude. The attempts repeatedly made by 

 the government of Spanish Guiana, since the expeditions of Iturria 

 and Solano, to reach and to pass the Pacaraima mountains, have 

 only produced very inconsiderable results. When the Spaniards, 

 in travelling to the missions of the Catalonian Capuchin monks of 

 Barceloneta at the confluence of the Caroni and the Rio Paragua, 

 ascended the latter river, in going southward, to its junction with 

 the Paraguamusi, they founded at the site of the latter junction the 

 mission of Guirion, which at first received the pompous name of 

 Ciudad de Guirion. I place it in about 4 of north latitude. From 

 thence the governor Centurion, stimulated by the exaggerated ac- 

 counts given by two Indian chiefs, Paranacare and Arimuicapi, 

 of the powerful nation of the Ipurucotos, to search for El Dorado, 

 prosecuted what were then called spiritual conquests still farther, 

 and founded, beyond the Pacaraima mountains the two villages of 

 Santa Rosa and San Bautista de Caudacacla; the former on the 

 higher eastern bank of the Uraricapara, a tributary of the' Uraricuera 

 which, in the narrative of Rodriguez, I find called Rio Curaricara; 

 and the latter six or seven German (24 or 28 English) geographical 

 miles farther to the east south-east. The astronomer of the Portu- 

 guese Boundary Commission, Don Antonio Pires de Sylva Pontes 

 Lenie, captain of a frigate, and the captain of engineers, Don Ricardo 

 Franco d' Almeida de Serra, who, between 1787 and 1804, surveyed 

 with the greatest care the whole course of the Rio Branco and its 

 upper branches, called the westernmost part of the Uraricapara, the 

 ei Valley of Inundation." They place the Spanish mission of Santa 

 Rosa in 3 46' N; lat., and point out the route which leads from 

 thence northward across the chain of mountains to the Cano Ano- 

 capra, an affluent of the Paraguamusi, by means of which one passes 

 from the basin of the Rio Branco to that of the Caroni. Two maps 

 of these Portuguese officers, which contain the whole details of the 

 trigonometrical survey of the windings of the Rio Branco, the Ura- 

 ricuera, the Tacutu, and the Mahu, have been kindly communicated 

 to Colonel Lapie and myself by the Count of Linhares. These valu- 

 able unpublished documents of which I have made use, are in the 



