360 



I have often spoken in my voyage to the Oroonoko, of 

 the influence produced by the immense savannahs of America 

 (between the Apure, the Meta, and the Guaviare, and between 

 the sources of the Essequebo, and the Rio Parime, or Rio 

 Branco), on the manners and language of the natives. The 

 Llanos excite and cherish the taste for a wandering life, 

 even in a region of the world where there are no herds to 

 give milk, and where the Jndios vagos y andantes live only 

 by hunting and fishing. The Llanos contribute also to 

 generalize a small number of tongues, and spread them 

 over a vast space. (Vol. iv, 445 ; Vol. v, 14, 605.) The 

 greatest mass of the nations we have just named inhabit a 

 country covered with forests and mountains, and in which 

 there is no other path than the course of rivers. The diffi- 

 culty of removing, and the obstacles which the force of the 

 vegetation, and the depth of the rivers oppose to hunting 

 and fishing, have led the savage to become an husbandman. 

 It is on this mountainous region, between the Esmeralda, the 

 sources of the Carony, the sources of the Apure, and that of 

 the Atabapo, where man is insulated and immoveable, that the 

 appearance of the greatest diversity of tongues has been 

 produced. The degree of barbarism in which those wan- 

 dering people, the Guamos, theAchaguas, and the Otomacks, 

 were heretofore found, differs as much from that of the 

 Macos, the Caracicanas, and the Maquiritares, who are fixed 

 to the soil, and given to cultivation, as their stature, and the 

 colour of their skin (Vol. v. 567) . The nations of the Up- 

 per-Oroonoko inhabit plains covered with forests, in the 

 midst of which rise lofty mountains, but they are not, pro- 

 perly speaking, a mountainous people. Here, as on the table- 

 land of Asia, conquering hordes issued from the steppes in 

 the vicinity of the mountains and forests. The warlike and 

 wandering Caribs have long been the masters and the 

 scourge of those countries which they pass through to seize 

 upon slaves. In their struggle with the Cabres, they were 



