388 CABIB SLAVE-DEALERS. 



and the Bio Negro, when we recollect that so many of the 

 rivers of America form, as it were, deltas at their con- 

 fluence with other rivers. Thus the Bio Branco and the 

 Bio Jupura enter by a great number of branches into the 

 Bio Negro and the Amazon. At the confluence of the 

 Jupura there is a much more extraordinary phenomenon. 

 Before this river joins the Amazon, the latter, which is the 

 principal recipient, sends oft 7 three branches called Uaranapu, 

 Manhama, and Avateparana, to the Jupura, which is but a 

 tributary stream. The Portuguese astronomer, Bibeiro, has 

 proved this important fact. The Amazon gives waters to 

 the Jupura itself, before it receives that tributary stream. 



The Bio Conorichite, or Itinivini, formerly facilitated the 

 trade in slaves carried on by the Portuguese in the Spanish 

 territory. The slave-traders went up by the Cassiquiare 

 and the Cano Mee to Conorichite; and thence dragged 

 their canoes by a portage to the roclielas of Manuteso, in 

 order to enter the Atabapo. This abominable trade lasted 

 till about the year 1756 ; when the expedition of Solano r 

 and the establishment of the missions on the banks of the 

 Bio Negro, put an end to it. Old laws of Charles V 

 and Philip III* had forbidden under the most severe penal- 

 ties (such as the being rendered incapable of civil employ- 

 ment, and a fine of two thousand piastres), "the conversion 

 of the natives to the faith by violent means, and sending 

 armed men against them;" but notwithstanding these wise 

 and humane laws, the Bio Negro, in the middle of the last 

 century, was no further interesting in European politics, 

 than as it facilitated the entradas, or hostile incursions, and 

 favoured the purchase of slaves. The Caribs, a trading and 

 warlike people, received from the Portuguese and the Dutch, 

 knives, fish-hooks, small mirrors, and all sorts of glass 

 beads. They excited the Indian chiefs to make war against 

 each other, bought their prisoners, and carried off, them- 

 selves, by stratagem or force, all whom they found in their 

 way. These incursions of the Caribs comprehended an in> 

 mense extent of land; they went from the banks of the 

 Essequibo and the Carony, by the Bupunuri and the Pa- 

 raguamuzi on one side, directly south towards the Bio 

 Branco ; and on the other, to the south-west, following the 

 * 26 Jan. 1523 : and 10 Oct. 1618. 



