Ill, ^nmhoidii on the Great Cavern of the (kiacharo, , 89 
young birds are opened in the cavern, they are found to contain 
all sorts of hard and dry fruits, which furnish, under the singu» 
iar name of guaeharo seed, semilla del gnacharo^ a very cele- 
brated remedy against intermittent fevers. The old birds carry 
these seeds to their young. They are carefully collected, and 
sent to the sick at Cariaco, and other places of the low regions^ 
where fevers are prevalent. 
We followed, as we continued our progress through the 
cavern, the banks of the stnall river which issued from it, and 
is from twenty-eight to thirty feet wid^. We walked on the 
banks, as far as the hills formed of calcareous incrustations per- 
mitted us. When the torrent winds among very high masses 
of stalactites, we were often obliged to descend into its bed, 
which is only two feet in depth. We learnt, with surprise, that 
this subterraneous rivulet is the ofigin of the river Ckripe, 
which, at a few leagues distance, aftet having joined the small 
river of Santa Maria, is navigable for canoes. It enters iritb the 
river Areo under the nkme of Canno de Terezen. We foutid 
on the banks of the subterraneous rivulet a great quantity 
of palm-tree wood, the remains of trunks, on which the In- 
dians climb to reach the liests hanging to the roofs of the ca- 
vern. The rings, formed by the vestiges of the old footstalks 
of the leaves, furnish as it were the footsteps of a ladder perpen- 
dicularly placed. 
The Grotto of Caripe preserves the sanle direction, the 
same breadth, and its primitive height of sixty or severity feet, 
to the distance of 1458 feet, accurately measured. I have ne- 
ver seen a cavern in either continent, of so uniform and regular 
a construction. We had great difficulty in persuading the In- 
dians to pass beyond the outer part of the grotto^ the only part 
which they annually visit to collect the fat. The whole author 
rity of los padres was necessary, to induce then! to advance as far 
as'the spot where the soil rises abruptly at an inclination of sixty 
degrees, and where the torrent forms a small subterraneous cas- 
cade*. The natives connect mystic ideas with this cave, inhabited 
by nocturnal birds ; they believe, that the souls of their ancestors 
* We find this phenomenon of a subterranean cascade, but on a much larger 
scale, in England at Yordas Cave, n6ar Kingsdale, in Yorkshire. 
