60 



CUMANA. 



scientific attainments. On disembarking" their in- 

 struments, they had the pleasure of rinding that none 

 of them had been damaged. They hired a spacious 

 house in a situation favourable for astronomical 

 observations, in which they enjoyed an agreeable 

 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 native 

 of Guinea, but had lived for some years on the ele- 

 vated 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- 

 bourhood of the city is remarkable for the woods 

 of cactus which are spread over the arid lands. 

 Some of these plants were thirty or forty feet high, 

 covered with lichens, and divided into branches in 

 the form of a candelabrum. When the large species 

 grow in groups they form a thicket, which, while it 

 is almost impenetrable, is extremely dangerous on 

 account of the poisonous serpents that frequent it. 



The fortress of St. Antonio, which is built on a 

 calcareous hill, commands the town, and forms a pic- 

 turesque object to vessels entering the port. On the 

 south- western slope of the same rock are the rums 



