INTRODUCTION TO THE GOVERNOR. 69 
of the Pizarro to the governor of the province, Don 
Vicente Emparan, who received them with frank- 
ness; expressed his satisfaction at the resolution 
which they had taken of remaining for some time 
in New Andalusia ; showed them cottons dyed with 
native plants and furniture made of indigenous 
wood ; and surprised them with questions indicative 
of scientific attainments. On disembarking their 
instruments, they had the pleasure of finding that 
none of them had been damaged. They hired a 
spacious house in a situation favourable for astrono- 
mical observations, in which they enjoyed an agree- 
able coolness when the breeze arose, the windows 
being without glass, or even the paper panes which 
are often substituted for it at Cumana. 
The passengers all left the vessel. Those who 
had been attacked by the fever recovered so very 
slowly, that some were seen a month after, who, 
notwithstanding the care bestowed upon them by 
their countrymen, were still in a state of extreme 
debility. The hospitality of the inhabitants of the 
Spanish colonies is such that the poorest stranger is 
sure of receiving the kindest treatment. Among 
the sick landed here was a negro, who soon fell into 
a state of insanity and died; which fact our author 
mentions, as a proof that persons born in the torrid 
zone are liable to suffer from the heat of the tropics 
after having resided in temperate climates. This 
individual, who was a robust young man, was a na- 
tive of Guinea, but had lived for some years on the 
elevated plain of Castile. 
The soil around Cumana is composed of gypsum 
and calcareous breccia, and is supposed at a remote 
period to have been covered by the sea. The neigh- 
