Native Burial-place. 69 



many places fresh water streams, running over bare patches of 

 this rock, had eaten away narrow gutter channels, and that in 

 other places wUcre a broad sheet of water flowed slowly — as 

 from a turf bank — over a long gently-sloping table of rock, 

 an incrustation of hard calcareous matter had been deposited, 

 presenting a sort of " ripple-marked " appearance, and reminding 

 one of the effect produced when a film of slowly-moving water 

 is submitted to the influence of intense cold. When viewed 

 from a distance, the limestone hills presented a whitish bleached 

 appearance, which contrasted strangely with the sombre hues 

 of the other greenstone and s}'enite hills. Of this description 

 was " Silvertop," a lofty and conspicuous mountain on the south 

 side of the Trinidad Channel, which was frequently used by our 

 surveyors as a landmark. 



The next port to the eastward is Rosario Bay. It was named 

 by Sarmiento " Puerto de Nuestra Seiiora Del Rosario." The 

 rock formation here is limestone, and of the kind above men- 

 tioned, but "the effects of frequent rain in washing away the 

 more soluble parts of the rock were not only manifested by 

 the honeycombed appearance of exposed surfaces, but also by 

 the prevalence of caves of most irregular shape. Soon after 

 v/e had anchored, Sub-lieutenant Beresford and I, who had 

 gone away in the skiff, were paddling around an islet with 

 lofty and precipitous sides, when we noticed in the face of a 

 bare rocky cliff a suspicious-looking dark opening, partly blocked 

 up with stones, and situated about thirty feet above the sea 

 level. We ran the boat alongside the rocks, and Beresford 

 kept her from bumping while I climbed up the cliff to recon- 

 noitre. On clearing away a heap of stones and rubbish, I laid 

 bare a sort of niche in the rock, in which were portions of a 

 human skeleton, the long bones h'ing together in a compact 

 bundle, as if they had been so placed there when in the dried 

 state. Not many yards from this crevice we soon discovered 

 a small cave in the rock, and partly imbedded in the soil 



