EXPEDITION TO SURINAM. 263 



have feen many of them kept on the eilates, where, like CHAP, 

 the powefa, they are reared for domeftic ufes, and feed ' 

 among the turkeys and other poultry. 



On the 6th 1 received fix gallons of rum from Para- 

 maribo, four of which I gave as a prefent to Fourgeoud. 



About fix in the evening two of our flaves, who had 

 been out to cut maoicoles, brought intelligence that a 

 gang of rebels had paffed not above a mile from the 

 camp, headed by a Captain Arico, with whom they had 

 fpoken on the banks of the Cormoetibo Creek, but could 

 not tell which way they fi:eered their courfe, fo much 

 had they been terrified. On this information we received 

 orders to purfue them by break of day ; and the next 

 morning, at fi,ve o'clock, all was ready, and we again 

 broke up, leaving a detachment with the fiores, and re- 

 paired to the fpot whence the intelligence proceeded. 

 Here we faw a large palm or mawrifee tree floating in 

 the river, and moored to the oppofite ihore by a nebee, 

 which plainly indicated that Arico, with his men, had 

 crofied the creek, which they do by riding aftride on the 

 floating trunk, the one behind the other, in which man- 

 ner they are ferried over, (fometimes with women and 

 children) by thofe who are the beft fwimmers. 



Notwithftanding this plain evidence, the faith of our 

 colonel, Fourgeoud, now began to waver, and he averred 

 that it was no more than a ftratagem of the rebels, who, 

 he faid, had come from the place to which we fuppofed 



* The largeft of all the palm fpecies, 



them 



