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In the season of inundations these clumps of 

 mauritia, with their leaves in the form of a fan, 

 have the appearance of a forest rising from the 

 bosom of the waters. The navigator, in proceed- 

 ing along the channels of the delta of the Oroo- 

 noko at night, sees with surprise the summit of 

 the palm-trees illumined by large fires. These 

 are the habitations of the Guaraons (Tivit- 

 ivas and Waraweties of Raleigh *), which are 

 suspended from the trunks of trees. These tribes 

 hang up mats in the air, which they fill with 

 earth, and kindle, on a layer of moist clay, the fire 

 necessary for their household wants. They have 

 owed their liberty and their political indepen- 

 dence for ages to the quaking and swampy soil, 

 which they pass over in the time of drought, and 

 on which they alone know how to walk in secu- 

 rity to their solitude in the delta of the Oroono- 

 ko, to their abode on the trees, where religious 



group of pa ImcE montance, which rises in the Andes of Gua- 

 nacas nearly to the limit of perpetual snow, was (I believe) 

 entirely unknown before our travels in America. (Nov. Gen. 

 vol. i, p. 317 ; Semanario de Santa Fe de Bogota, 1 819, No. 21, 

 p. 163.) 



* The Indian name of the tribe of Uaraus (Guarau-nos of 

 the Spaniards) may be recognized in the Warawety (Ouarau- 

 ety) of Raleigh, one of the branches of the Tivitivas. See 

 Discovery of Guiana 1570, p. 90, and the sketch of the 

 habitations of the Guaraons, in Raleghi brevts Descrip. 

 Guiance, 1594, tab. 4. (Laet. p. 648, 661 ; Gili, vol. i, p. 

 xxxv j Depons, vol. i, p. 292, 308 : Leblond, p 430, 444.) 



