BLACK AND WIJTTE WATEBB. 27C 



lute want of wind render the air more burning aud more 

 irritating in its contact with the skin. 



" How comfortable must people be in the moon !" said a 

 Salive Indian to Father Gumilla ; " she looks so beautiful 

 and so clear, that she must be free from mosquitos." These 

 words, which denote the infancy of a people, are very remark- 

 able. The satellite of the earth appears to ail savage 

 nations the abode of the blessed, the country of abundance. 

 The Esquimaux, who counts among his riches a plank or 

 trunk of a tree, thrown by the currents on a coast destitute 

 of vegetation, sees in the moon plains covered with forests ; 

 the Indian of the forests of Orinoco there beholds open savan- 

 nahs, where the inhabitants are never stung by mosquitos. 



After proceeding further to the south, where the system 

 of yellowish-brown waters commences,* on the banks of the 

 Atabapo, the Tuni, the Tuamini, and the Bio Negro, we 

 enjoyed an unexpected repose. These rivers, like the 

 Orinoco, cross thick forests, but the tipulary insects, as well 

 as the crocodiles, shun the proximity of the Hack waters. 

 Possibly these waters, which are a little colder, and chemically 

 different from the white waters, are adverse to the larvae of 

 tipulary insects and gnats, which may be considered as real 

 aquatic animals. Some small rivers, the colour of which is 

 deep blue, or yellowish-brown (as the Toparo, the Mataveni, 

 and the Zaina), are exceptions to the almost general rule of 

 the absence of inosguitos over the black waters. These 

 three rivers swarm with them ; and the Indians themselves 

 fixed our attention on the problematic causes of this pheno- 

 menon. In going down the Rio Negro, we breathed freely 

 at Maroa, Daripe, and San Carlos, villages situated on the 

 boundaries of Brazil. But this improvement of our situation 

 was of short continuance; our sufferings recommenced as soon 

 as we entered the Cassiquiare. At Esmeralda, at the eastern 

 extremity of the Upper Orinoco, where ends the known 

 world of the Spaniards, the clouds of mosquitos are almost 

 as thick as at the Great Cataracts. At Mandavaca we found 

 an old missionary, who told us with an air of sadness, that 

 he had had "his twenty years of mosquitos"* in America. 



* Generally called 'black waters' (agvat ntgrn*}. 

 f ' Yo tengo mis veinte afioi de mosquitos." 



f 3 



