207 



finements in debauchery. His sister was still 

 living in my time, in \he vicinity of the mission 

 of Maypures. We smile at hearing, that the 

 names of Cuseru, Imu, and Cocuy are as cele- 

 brated in those countries, as the names of Hol- 

 kar, Tippoo, and the most powerful princes, 

 are in India. The chiefs of the Guaypunabis 

 and the Manitivitanoes fought with small bodies 

 of two or three hundred men ; but in their pro- 

 tracted struggles they devastated the missions, 

 where the poor monks had only fifteen or twenty 

 Spanish soldiers at their disposal. These hordes, 

 contemptible for their numbers and means of 

 defence, spread as much terror as armies ; and 

 if the Jesuits succeeded in preserving their set- 

 tlements, it was only by opposing cunning to 

 strength. They attached some powerful chiefs 

 to their interests, and enfeebled the Indians 

 by disunion. When the expedition of Ituriaga 

 and Solano arrived at the Oroonoko, the mis- 

 sions had no longer to fear* the incursions of 

 the Caribbees. Cuseru, the chief of the Guaypu- 



* From the year 1733 to 1735 the Carribbee nation was 

 dangerous to the missions of the Lower Oroonoko. It was 

 during this interval, that the missionaries of Mamo, and the 

 bishop, Don Nicolas de Labrid, who had been a canon of 

 the Chapter of Lyons, were massacred by the savages. Fa- 

 ther Rotella founded in 1740 the mission of Cabruta, by 

 assembling together the Cabres, to oppose the incursions of 

 the Caribbees. These incursions ceased entirely about the 

 year 1750. 



