1881.] Geography and Travels. : 501 
plored the Beni and made very valuable additions to our know- 
ledge of this heretofore almost unknown region. 
Dr. Heath writes from Reyes, Bolivia, December 20, 1880: 
“The question of the Beni is solved. The work of Professor 
Orton is finished. I made the trip from Cabinas (rubber camps 
on the Madidi) in a canoe with two Indians. I left Cabinas Sep- 
tember 27th, and after delays from sickness of my men, at 8 A.M., 
October 8th, discovered a new river entering from the south, and 
at mid-day of the 8th, arrived at the junction of the Madre de 
Dios with the Beni. No other white man has ever seen the 
mouth of this magnificent river. Crude measurement gave 735 
feet for the width of the Beni, and 2350 for that of the Madre de 
ios. Took careful observations for latitude and longitude. At 
6,50 A. M. of the oth, I passed the mouth of a river the size of the 
Yacuma, entering from the north, to which I gave the name 
rton. At night we slept on a sand bar joined to a large island. 
On the 1oth we passed this island, and at 8 a. M. another large 
one, and at 10 A. M. came to a line of rocks obstructing the river 
and making rapids, One mile further down we came to the main 
fall, which exhibits a perpendicular descent of the entire river of 
thirty feet. We occupied the remainder of the roth in drawing 
our little craft over the rocks to the water below. i 
risk we passed the waves below the falls and camped. On the 
morning of October 11, we passed some rocks in the river cor- 
responding to the rapids of the Palo Grande of the River Mamoré, 
but which here offer no serious obstructions to navigation. At 
10 A. M., October 11, 1880, we arrived at the mouth of the Beni 
—that is, at the junction of the Beni and Mamoré Rivers. From 
thence we ascended the Mamoré, three hundred miles, to Exal- 
tacion and Santa Ana to this place, two hundred miles west over 
the Pampas ; brought my boat on an ox cart. 
the River Beni, the productions of the rubber camps on the River 
Madidi have ascended the River Beni two hundred miles to 
dred miles around, in place of less than three hundred miles 
__ The waters of the Beni come down from the gold mines 
of Bolivia, and through forests of cinchona trees, and those of the 
Mad 
P re de Dios from a much larger area of similar territory of 
eru, 
