100 
HALT AT THE HATO. 
by the name of peones llaneros, are partly freed-men and 
partly slaves. They are constantly exposed to the burn- 
ing heat of the tropical sun. Their food is meat, dried in 
the air, and a little salted; and of this even their horses 
sometimes partake. Being always in the saddle, they fancy 
they cannot make the slightest excursion on foot. "\Ve 
found an old negro slave, who managed the farm in the 
absence of his master. He told us of herds composed of 
several thousand cows, that were grazing in the steppes; yet 
we asked in vain for a bowl of milk. We were offered, in a 
calabash, some yellow, muddy, and fetid water, drawn from a 
neighbouring pool. The indolence of the inhabitants of the 
Llanos is such that they do not dig wells, though they know 
that almost everywhere, at ten feet deep, fine springs are 
found in a stratum of conglomerate, or red sandstone. 
After suffering during one half of the year from the effect 
of inundations, they quietly resign themselves, during the 
other half, to the most distressing deprivation of water. 
The old negro advised us to cover the cup with a linen 
cloth, and drink as through a filter, that we might not be 
incommoded by the smell, and might swallow less of the 
yellowish mud suspended in the water. We did not then 
think that we should afterwards be forced, during whole 
months, to have recourse to this expedient. The waters of 
the Orinoco are always loaded with earthy particles; they 
are even putrid, where dead bodies of alligators are found 
in the creeks, lying on banks of sand, or half-buried in the 
mud. 
No sooner were our instruments unloaded and safely 
placed, than our mules were set at liberty to go, as they 
say here, para busoar agua, that is, “to search for water.” 
There are little pools round the farm, which the animals 
find, guided by their instinct, by the view of some scattered 
tufts of mauritia, and by the sensation of humid coolness, 
caused by little currents of air amid an atmosphere which to 
us appears calm and tranquil. When the pools of water 
are far distant, and the people of the farm are too lazy to 
lead the cattle to these natural watering-places, they confine 
them during five or six hours in a very hot stable before 
they let them loose. Excess of thirst then augments their 
sagacity, sharpening as it were their senses and their 
