18 
INHABITANTS OF THE ISLANDS. 
cultivated, and extremely fertile on account of the vapours 
that rise from the lake. Burro, the largest of these islands, 
is two miles in length, and is inhabited by some families 
of mestizos, who rear goats. These simple people seldom 
visit the shore of Mocundo. To them the lake appears of 
immense extent ; they have plantains, cassava, milk, and a 
little fish. A hut constructed of reeds ; hammocks woven 
from the cotton which the neighbouring fields produce ; a 
large stone on which the fire is made ; the ligneous fruit of 
the tutuma (the calabash) in which they draw water, con- 
stitute their domestic establishment. An old mestizo who 
offered us some goat’s milk had a beautiful daughter. We 
learned from our guide, that solitude had rendered him as 
mistrustful as he might perhaps have been made by the 
society of men. The day before our arrival, some hunters 
had visited the island. They were overtaken by the shades 
of night ; and preferred sleeping in the open air to return- 
ing to Mocundo. This news spread alarm throughout the 
island. The father obliged the young girl to climb up a 
very lofty zamang or acacia, which grew in the plain at 
some distance from the hut, while he stretched himself at 
the foot of the tree, and did not permit his daughter to 
descend till the hunters had departed. 
The lake is in general well stocked with fish ; though it 
furnishes only three kinds, the flesh of which is soft and 
insipid, the guavina, the vagre, and the sardina. The two 
last descend into the lake with the streams that flow into 
it. The guavina, of which I made a drawing on the spot, 
is 20 inches long aud 3'5 broad. It is perhaps a new 
species of the genus erythrina of Groaoviua. It has large 
silvery scales edged with green. This fish is extremely 
voracious, and destroys other kinds. The fishermen as- 
sured us that a small crocodile, the bava* which often 
approached us when we were bathing, contributes also to 
the destruction of the fish. We never could succeed in pro- 
curing this reptile so as to examine it close!} : it generally 
* The bava, or bavilla, is very common at Bordoucs, near Cumana. 
See vol. i, p. 160. The name of bava ( baveuse ) has misled M. Depons; 
he takes this reptile for a fish of our seas, the Blennius pholis. (\ oyage 
i la Terre Ferae.) The Blennius pholis (smooth blenny), is called by 
the French baveuse (slaverer), in Spanish, baba . 
