EXPEDITION TO THE ORINOCO. 287 



recommendations from Don Urquijo, the new and all-powerful 

 minister, softened all hearts ' in my favour. Never has a 

 natural philosopher been permitted to travel about with so 

 much freedom. For these reasons the expedition has been far 

 less expensive than might have been supposed, seeing that on 

 the rivers I had twenty-four Indians for months together in 

 my employ, while in the interior I often required fourteen 

 mules for the transport of instruments and plants. . . . 



' I value my independence more and more every day, and for 

 this reason I have scrupulously avoided accepting the smallest 

 pecuniary assistance from any Government : if the German news- 

 papers should happen to translate an article which has appeared 

 in an English paper concerning me in which, amid much 

 of a nattering nature, it is stated " that I am travelling by 

 commission of the Spanish Grovernment, and am destined to a 

 high position in the Council for India " you will be as greatly 

 amused by it as I was. Should I be permitted a safe return to 

 Europe, I shall be occupied with plans widely different from 

 anything connected with the Consejo de Indias. Under the 

 auspices in which I started life, I seem to be intended for 

 activity, and should I succumb to these exertions, those who 

 know me as well as you do are aware that it is for no mean 

 object for which I sacrifice myself. 



4 We Northern Europeans have, it seems to me, a strange and, 

 I might almost say, an extravagant prejudice against the 

 Spanish people. I have now for two years been living on 

 intimate terms with all classes of society, from the Capuchins 

 with whom I spent some time at their mission stations among 

 the Chaymas Indians, to the Viceroy, and I have become 

 almost as familiar with the Spanish language as I am with my 

 mother tongue : this intimacy has given me opportunity for 

 observing that this nation, notwithstanding the tyranny of the 

 Government and the influence of the priests, is making great 

 strides in intellectual culture, and possesses the elements of a 

 grand character. . . . 



' I have every reason to congratulate myself upon my 

 travelling companion, Bonpland. He is a worthy disciple of 

 Jussieu, Desfontaines, and Richard, and is extremely active and 

 industrious ; he possesses much tact, easily accommodating 



