200 



the coast. A reddish vapour veiled the horizon, 

 It was near sunset, and the breeze did not yet 

 blow. We reposed ourselves in the lonely farms 

 known under the names of-Cambury and the 

 House of the Canarian (Casa del Islengo). The 

 river of hot water, along the banks of which we 

 passed, became deeper and deeper. A crocodile, 

 more than nine feet long, lay dead on the strand. 

 We wished to examine it's teeth, and the inside 

 of it's mouth ; but having been exposed to the 

 Sun for several weeks, it exhaled a smell so 

 fetid, that we were obliged to relinquish our 

 design, and remount our horses. When ar- 

 rived at the level of the sea, the road turns to 

 the East, and crosses a barren shore a league 

 and a half broad, resembling that of Cumana- 

 We there found some scattered cactuses, a 

 sesuvium, a few plants of coccoloba uvifera, and 

 along the coast some avicennias and mangroves. 

 We forded the Guaiguaza, and the Rio Estevan, 

 which by their frequent overflowings form 

 great pools of stagnant water. Small rocks of 

 meandrites, madreporites, and other corals^ 

 either ramified or with a rounded surface, rise 

 in this vast plain, like those that threaten the 

 mariner ; and seem to attest the recent retreat 

 of the sea. But these masses of the habitations 

 of polypi are only fragments imbedded in a 

 breccia with a calcareous cement. I say a 

 breccia, because we must not confound the 



