THE MANATI 169 



beneath which the jaguar had lain. He was there no longer, 

 and it would have been imprudent to have pursued him into 

 the forest, where we must have dispersed, or advanced in 

 single file, amidst the intertwining lianas. 



In the evening we passed the mouth of the Cafio del 

 Manati, thus named on account of the immense quantity of 

 manatis caught there every year. This herbivorous animal 

 of the cetaceous family, is called by the Indians apcia and 

 avia* and it attains here generally ten or twelve feet in 

 length. It usuaDv weighs from five hundred to eight hun- 

 dred pounds, but it is asserted that one has been taken of 

 eight thousand pounds weight. The manati abounds in the 

 Orinoco below the cataracts, in the Bio Meta, and in the 

 A pure, between the two islands of Carizales and Coiiserva. 

 "We found no vestiges of nails on the external surface or 

 the edges of the fins, which are quite smooth ; but little 

 rudiments of nails appear at the third phalanx, when the 

 skin of the fins is taken off. "We dissected one of these 

 animals, which was nine feet long, at Carichana, a Mission 

 of the Orinoco. The upper lip was four inches longer than 

 the lower one. It was covered with a very fine skin, and served 

 as a proboscis. The inside of the mouth, which has a sensi- 

 ble warmth in an animal newly killed, presented a very 

 singular conformation. The tongue was almost motionless ; 

 but in front of the tongue there was a fleshy excrescence in 

 each jaw, and a cavity lined with a very hard skin, into which 

 the excrescence fitted. The manati eats such quantities of 

 grass, that we have found its stomach, which is divided into 

 several cavities, and its intestines, (one hundred and eight 

 feet long,) filled with it. On opening the animal at the 

 back, we were struck with the magnitude, form, and situa- 

 tion of its lungs. They have very large cells, and resemble 

 immense swimming-bladders. They are three feet long. 

 Filled with air, they have a bulk of more than a thousand 

 cubic inches. I was surprised to see that, possessing such 



* The first of these words belongs to the Tamanac language, and the 

 second to the Ottomae. Father Gili proves, in opposition to Oviedo, 

 that the manati (fish with hands) is not Spanish, but belongs to the 

 languages of Hayti (St. Domingo) and the Maypurec. I believe also 

 that, according to the genius of the Spanish tongue, the anizva! would 

 have been called manudo or manon, but not manati. 



