154 THE GREAT CATARACTS OF THE ORINOCO. 



it and the present channel also gives evidence of having 

 been overflowed ; so that the rocks and wooded peaks 

 which now rise in this dry tract were formerly islands in 

 the great cnrrent that anciently rolled its floods across the 

 continent. It was the opinion of Humboldt — and we see 

 nothin<T to militate against its probability — that a canal 

 could be cut around the cataracts of Atures and Maypures, 

 and thus this great river rendered navigable a distance of 

 npward of twelve hundred miles, or nearly to its source 

 among the lofty mountains, to the east of its bifurca- 

 tion. The perpendicular fall which the river makes in its 

 descent of these rapids is not so great as might be sup- 

 posed from the turbulent appearance of the waters ; and 

 the nature of the ground presents excellent facilities for 

 artificial channels around these obstructions to the free 

 navigation of the river. The entire fall of the Maypures 

 scarcely amounts to more than thirty feet, while that of 

 the Atui-es is still less. 



At the upper terminus of the portage, which is a league 

 in length, Ave found three mud houses ; one jiossessed by a 

 Spanish family, another by some Indians, and the third 

 abandoned. This was the village of Maypures, once a 

 thriving mission-station, containing in the time of the 

 Jesuits about six hundred inhabitants, but now almost 

 deserted, its site overgrown with bushes and forest, with 

 here and there sad traces of past prosperity. As we have 

 before remarked in speaking of Atures, the insalubrity of 

 the climate about the Great Cataracts, together with the 

 intolerable plague of insects, has caused the depopulation 

 of these regions. Night here brings no relief from the 

 annoyances and pains of the day. There is no cooling 

 breeze, as at Atures, upon the approach of evening, to as- 

 suage the heat of a burning atmosphere ; for at Maypures 

 no wind is ever felt. Time has made no diminution in the 

 number of insects. At the commencement of the present 



