ANNOTATIONS AND ADDITIONS. 201 



manuscript maps of the Bureau de la Marine at Rio Janeiro from 

 indicating or admitting a constant connection between the Rupunuri 

 and the Lake of Amucu. In D' Anville's maps, the rivers are better 

 drawn in the first edition of his South America, published in 1748, 

 than in the more widely circulated edition of 1760. Schomburgk's 

 travels have completely established this general independence of the 

 basins of the Rupunuri and the Essequibo ; but he remarks that 

 during the rainy season the Rio Waa-Ekuru, a tributary of the Ru- 

 punuri, is in connection with the Cano Pirara. Such is the state of 

 these river basins, which are, as it were, still imperfectly developed, 

 and are almost entirely without separating ridges. 



The Rupunuri and the village of Anai (lat. 3 56', long. 58 34') 

 are at present recognized as the political boundary between the 

 British and the Brazilian territories in these uncultivated regions. 

 Sir Robert Schomburgk makes his chronologically determined lon- 

 gitude of the Lake of Amucu depend on the mean of several lunar 

 distances (east and west) measured by him during his stay at Anai, 

 where he was detained some time by severe illness. His longitudes 

 for these points of the Parime are in general a degree more easterly 

 than the longitudes of my map of Columbia. I am far from throw- 

 ing any doubt on the observations of lunar distances taken at Anai, 

 and would only remark that their calculation is important, if it is 

 desired to carry the comparison from the Lake of Amucu to Es- 

 meralda, which I found in long. 68 23' 19" W. from Paris (66 

 21' 19" Gr.). 



We see, then, the great Mar de la Parima which was so difficult 

 to displace from our maps that, after my return from America, it 

 was still set down as having a length of 160 English geographical 

 miles reduced by the result of modern researches to the little Lake 

 of Amucu, of two or three miles, circumference. The illusions cher- 

 ished for nearly two centuries (several hundred lives were lost in 

 the last Spanish expedition for the discovery of El Dorado, in 

 1775,) have thus finally terminated, leaving some results of geo- 

 graphical knowledge as their fruit. In 1512, thousands of soldiers 

 perished in the expedition undertaken by Ponce de Leon for the 

 discovery of the " Fountain of Youth," supposed to exist in one of 

 the Bahama Islands called Bimini, and which is not to be found on 



