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latitude. The mouth of the Rio Negro is in- 

 deed in the latitude of 3° 9'; but in this inter- 

 val the black and white waters are so singularly 

 mingled in the forests and the savannahs, that 

 we know not to what cause the coloration of 

 the waters must be attributed. The waters of 

 the Cassiquiare, which fall into the Rio Negro, 

 are as white as those of the Oroonoko, from 

 which it issues. Of two tributary streams of the 

 Cassiquiare very near each other, the Siapa and 

 the Pacimony, one is white, the other black. 



When the Indians are interrogated respecting 

 the causes of these strange colorations, they 

 answer, as questions in natural philosophy or 

 physiology are sometimes answered in Europe, 

 by repeating the fact in other terms. If you 

 address yourself to the missionaries, they reply, 

 as if they had the most convincing proofs of 

 their assertion, " the waters are coloured by 

 washing the roots of the sarsaparilla." The smi~ 

 laceae no doubt abound on the banks of the Rio 

 Negro, the Pacimony, and the Cababury • their 

 roots, macerated in the water, yield an extrac- 

 tive matter, that is brown, bitter, and mucilagi- 

 nous; but how many tufts of smilax have we 

 seen in places, where the waters were entirely 

 white ! In the marshy forest which we traversed, 

 to convey our canoe from the Rio Tuamini to 

 the Canno Pimichin and the Rio Negro, why, in 

 the same soil, did we ford alternately rivulets of 



