250 CANAL OF RASPADURA. 



name. Humboldt says he was the first person 

 who brought inteUigence to Europe of its exist- 

 ence; but he must be mistaken^ for he adds^ that 

 the curate of Novita caused this channel to be 

 dug by the Indians of his parish in the year 

 1770^ and I should imagine so extraordinary a 

 fact could hardly have escaped the notice of the 

 government of Madrid. This canal was formed 

 in a ravine periodically subject to natural inun- 

 dations^ which facihtated the inland navigation 

 between the rivers Atrato and St. Juan^ for 

 seventy-five leagues. Considerable quantities 

 of cocoa were conveyed by this route to Car- 

 thagena from the Pacific coast in small boats ; 

 and by uniting to it the streams known by 

 the names of Cano de las Animas^ Cano del 

 Calichi^ and Aguas Claras^ the Raspadura might 

 be easily enlarged.* But to return to the bay 

 of Cupica. An erroneous notion generally pre- 

 vailed among geographers^ of the continued 

 ridge of the Andes in this part of America^ and 

 of the absence of any transversal valley inter- 



* Vide Humboldt, vol. vi., p. 260, 



