525 



rapids of the Rio Manaye, near cape Nord (lat. 

 1° 50'), divides, in the parallel 2°, the northern 

 sources of the Essequibo, the Maroni, and the 

 Oyapock, from the southern sources of the Rio 

 Trombetas, Curupatuba, and Paru. The most 

 southern counter-forts of this chain draw nearer 

 the Amazon, at the distance of fifteen leagues. 

 These are the first heights that we perceived 

 after having left Xeberos and the mouth of the 

 Huallaga*. They are constantly seen in navigat- 

 ing from the mouth of the Rio Topayo towards 

 that of Paru, from the town of Santarem to 

 Almeirim. The peak Tripoupou-f- is placed 

 nearly in the meridian of the former of those 

 towns, and is celebrated among the Indians of 

 Upper Maroni. More to the east, at Melgaco, 

 the Serras do Velho and do Paru J are still dis- 

 distinguished in the horizon. The real limits 

 of this series of sources of the Rio Trombetas 



* Vol. vi, p. 431. See also La Condamine's, Votjage to the 

 Amazon, p. 143. The distance at which we see those coun- 

 ter-forts gives them 200 toises of absolute height. They are, 

 liowever only, says Condamine, the anterior hills of a long 

 ^hain of mountains extending from west to east, and of which 

 the summits form the points of partition of the waters 5 

 the northern waters flow towards the coast of Cayenne and 

 Surinam, and the southern towards the Amazon. 



t Lat, 2° 10', long. 1° 36 ' west of the meridian of Ca- 

 yenne, according to the map of Guyana, published at the 

 Depdt of the Marine, 1817. 



X Corographia Brazil, Vol. ii, p. 297. 



