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where the hills of basalt seem to have been 

 lifted up from the bottom of the sea! The 

 frequency of the pelicans, which are larger than 

 our swans, and of flamingoes, which fished in 

 the nooks, or harassed the pelicans in order to 

 seize their prey, indicated our approach to the 

 coast of Cumana. It is curious to observe at 

 sunrise how the sea-birds suddenly appear, and 

 animate the landscape, reminding us, in the 

 most solitary scenes, of the activity of our cities 

 at the dawn of day. We reached at nine in the 

 morning the gulf of Cariaco, which serves as a 

 roadstead to the town of Cumana. The hill, 

 crowned by the castle of St. Antonio, stood pro- 

 minent from it's whiteness on the dark curtain 

 of the inland mountains. We recognized with 

 pleasure the shore, where we had culled the first 

 plants of America, and where, some months later, 

 Mr. Bonpland had been in such danger. Among 

 the cactuses, that rise in columns and candela- 

 bras twenty feet high, appear the Indian huts of 

 the Guaykeries. Every part of the landscape 

 was known to us ; the forest of cactus, the scat- 

 tered huts, and that enormous ceiba, beneath 

 which we loved to bathe at the approach of 

 night. Our friends at Cumana came out to 

 meet us ; men of all casts, whom our frequent 

 herborizations had brought into contact with 

 us, expressed still greater joy, as a report of our 

 death on the banks of the Oroonoko had been 



