308 



speak only the American tongues, they are 

 ignorant of what passes " on the other bank of 

 the Ocean, beyond the great salt pool f but the 

 gowns of their missionaries are of a different 

 colour, and this displeases them extremely. 



I have stopped to paint the effects of national 

 animosities, which sage administrators have en- 

 deavoured to calm, but have been unable entirely 

 to set at rest. This rivalry has contributed to 

 the imperfection of the geographical knowledge, 

 which we have hitherto obtained respecting the 

 tributary rivers of the Amazon. When the 

 communications of the natives are impeded, 

 and one nation is established near the mouth, 

 and another in the upper part of the same river, 

 it is difficult for the persons who attempt to con- 

 struct maps, to acquire precise information. 

 The periodical inundations, and still more the 

 portages, by which boats are passed from one 

 stream to another, the sources of which are in 

 the same neighbourhood, have led to erroneous 

 ideas of bifurcations and branchings of rivers 

 that do not exist. The Indians of the Portu- 

 gueze missions, for instance, enter (as I was 

 informed upon the spot) the Spanish Rio Negro 

 on one side by the Rio Guainia* and the Rio 

 Tomo ; and the Upper Oroonoko on the other 



* It is thus that the Xie or Uexie (Oueicie, Guaixia ?)> 

 which flows in near the mission of San Marcellino, is called 

 at San Carlos del Rio Negro. 



