458 



help of their long tails, the surface of the agi- 

 tated waters. The horizon was bounded by a 

 zone of forests, but these forests no where reached 

 so far as the bed of the river. A vast beach 

 constantly parched by the heat of the Sun, de- 

 sert and bare as the shores of the sea, resembled 

 at a distance, from the effect of the mirage, pools 

 of stagnant water. These sandy shores, far from 

 fixing the limits of the river, rendered them un- 

 certain, by approaching or withdrawing them 

 alternately, according to the variable action of 

 the inflected rays. 



In these scattered features of the landscape, 

 in this character of solitude and of greatness, we 

 recognize the course of the Oroonoko, one of the 

 most majestic rivers of the New World. The 

 water, like the land, displays every where a cha- 

 racteristic and peculiar aspect. The bed of the 

 Oroonoko resembles not the bed of the Meta, the 

 Guaviare, the Rio Negro, or the Amazon. These 

 differences do not depend altogether on the 

 breadth or the velocity of the current : they are 

 connected with a multitude of impressions, 

 which it is easier to perceive upon the spot, than 

 to define with precision. Thus the mere form 

 of the waves, the tint of the waters, the aspect of 

 the sky and the clouds, would lead an expe- 

 rienced navigator to guess, whether he were in 

 the Atlantic, in the Mediterranean, or in the 

 equinoctial part of the Great Ocean. 



