THE LAKE CASSIPA. 83 



tries. Raleigh gives this basin forty miles in breadth; and, 

 ay all tin- lakes of Parima must have auriferous sands, he 

 does not fail to assert, that in summer, when the waters 

 retire, pieces of gold of considerable weight are found 

 there. 



The sources of the tributary streams of the Carony, the 

 Arui, and the Caura (Caroli, Arvi, and Caora,* of the 

 ancient geographers) being very near each other, this sug- 

 gested the idea of making all these rivers take their rise 

 from the pretended lake Cassipa. t Sanson has so much 

 enlarged this lake, that he gives it forty-two leagues in 

 length, and fifteen in breadth. The ancient geographers 

 phu-ed opposite to each other, with very little hesitation, the 

 tributary streams of the two banks of a river; and they 

 place the mouth of the Carony, and lake Cassipa, which 

 communicates by the Carony with the Orinoco, sometimes]: 

 above the confluence of the Meta. Thus it is carried back 

 by Houdius as far as the latitudes of 2 and 3, giving it the 

 form of a rectangle, the longest sides of which run from 

 north to south. This circumstance is worthy of remark, 

 because, in assigning gradually a more southern latitude to 

 the lake Cassipa, it has been detached from the Carony and 



pressly said, the original edition of 1596. Have these tribes of Ca&si 

 pagotos, Epuremei, and Orinoqueponi, so often mentioned by Raleigh, 

 disappeared ? or did some misapprehension give rise to these denomi- 

 nations? I am surprised to find the Indian words [of one of the different 

 Carib dialects?] Ezrabeta cassipuna aquerewana, translated by Raleigh, 

 " the great princes" or " greatest commander." Since acarwana certainly 

 signifies a chief, or any person who commands (Raleigh, pp. 6 and 7), 

 cassipnna perhaps means "great," and lake Cas=ipa is synonymous with 

 great lake. In the same manner Cass-iguiare may be a great river, for 

 iqniare, like veni, is, on the north of the Amazon, a termination common 

 to all rivers. Goto, however, in Cassipa-^ro/o, is a Caribbee term de- 

 noting a tribe. 



* D'Amille names the Rio Caura, Coari ; and the Rio Arui, Aroay. 

 I have not been able hitherto to guess what is meant by the Aloica 

 (Atoca, Atoica of Raleigh), which issues from the lake Cassipa, between 

 the C;mra and the Arui. 



t Raleigh makes only the Carony and the Arui issue from it (Hondius, 

 "e Caerte van het wonderbare landt Guiana, besocht door Sir Walter 

 Kaleir/h, 1594 1596): but in later maps, for instance that of Sanson, 

 the Rio Caura issues also from Lake Cassipa. 



J Sanson. Map for the Voyage ofAcunha, IG80. T d. South 

 rica, 1659. Coronelli, Indes occidentalet, 1689. 



VOL. ill. D 



