INDIANS—VEGETATION. 933 
house. The Christian converts at this station were 
Salivas, a social and mild people, having a great 
taste for music. 
Among these Indians they found a white woman, 
the sister of a Jesuit of New Grenada, and expe- 
rienced great pleasure in conversing with her with- 
out the aid of a third person. In every mission, 
says Humboldt, there are at least two interpreters, 
for the purpose of communicating between the monks 
and the catechumens, the former seldom studying 
the language of the latter. They are natives, some- 
what less stupid than the rest, but ill adapted for 
their office. They always attended the travellers in 
their excursions ; but little more could be got from 
them than a mere affirmation or negation. Some- 
times, in attempting to hold intercourse with the 
Indians, he preferred the language of signs,—a me- 
thod which he recommends to travellers, as the va- 
riety of languages spoken on the Meta, Orinoco, 
Casiquiare, and Rio Negro, is so great, that no one 
could ever make himself understood in them all. 
The scenery around the mission of Carichana ap- 
peared delightful. The village was situated on a 
grassy plain, bounded by mountains. Banks of rock, 
often more than 850 feet in circumference, scarcely 
elevated a few inches above the savannahs, and 
nearly destitute of vegetation, give a peculiar cha- 
racter to the country. On these stony flats they 
eagerly observed the rising vegetation in the differ- 
ent stages of its development : Lichens cleaving the 
rock and collected into crusts; a few succulent 
plants growing among little portions of quartz-sand ; 
and tufts of evergreen shrubs springing up in the 
black mould deposited in the hollows. At the dis- 
