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The military establishment of this frontier 

 consisted of seventeen soldiers, ten of whom 

 were detached for the security of the neighbour- 

 ing missions. The humidity of the air is such, 

 that there are not four muskets in a condition 

 to be fired. The Portugueze have from twenty- 

 five to thirty men, better clothed and armed, at 

 the little fort of San Jose de Maravitanos. We 

 found in the mission of San Carlos but one 

 garita, a square house, constructed with un- 

 baked bricks, and containing six field pieces. 

 The little fort, or, as they think proper to call 

 it here, the Castillo de San Felipe, is situate op- 

 posite San Carlos, on the western bank of the 

 Rio Negro. The commander made some scru- 

 ple of showing the fortaleza to Mr. Bonpland 

 and me; our passports expressed clearly the 

 power of measuring mountains, and performing 

 trigonometric operations on the land, whenever 

 we thought proper % but not of seeing fortified 

 places. Our fellow traveller, Don Nicholas 

 Solo, a Spanish officer, was more fortunate than 

 ourselves ; he was permitted to pass the river. 

 He found in a small plain, stripped of it's wood, 

 the commencement of a fortification of earth, 

 which, had it been finished, would have required 

 five hundred men for it's defence. It is a square 

 structure, the ditch of which is scarcely visible. 

 The parapet is five feet high, and strengthened 

 by large stones. There are two bastions on the 



