340 
■VARIETIES or WATER. 
avoid embroiling farther a nomenclature of rivers so arbi- 
trarily fixed, T will not propose new denominations. I shall 
continue, with Father Oaulin and the Spanish geographers, 
to call the river Esmeralda the Orinoco, or Upper Orinoco ; 
but I must observe that if the Orinoco, from San Fernando 
de Atabapo as far as the delta which it forms opposite the 
island of Trinidad, were regarded as the continuance ot 
the Rio Guaviare ; and if that part of the Upper Orinoco 
between the Esmeralda and the mission of San Fernando 
were considered a tributary stream ; the Orinoco would 
preserve, from the savannahs of San Juan de los Llanos 
and the eastern declivity of the Andes to its mouth, a more 
uniform and natural direction, that from south-west to 
north-east. _ * 
The Rio Paragua, or that part of the Orinoco east oi 
the mouth of the Guaviare, has clearer, more transparent, 
and purer water than the part of the Orinoco below San 
Fernando. The waters of the Guaviare, on the contrary, 
are white and turbid ; they have the same taste, according 
to the Indians, (whose organs of sense are extremely deli- 
cate and well practised,) as the waters of the Orinoco near 
the Great Cataracts. “Bring me the waters of three or 
four great rivers of these countries,” an old Indian of ta® 
missiou of Javita said to us ; “ on tasting each of them l 
will tell you, without fear of mistake, whence it was taken , 
whether it comes from a white or black river; the Orinoco 
or the Atabapo, the Paragua or the Guaviare.” The grea 
crocodiles and porpoises (toninas) which are alike comnio 
in the Rio Guaviare and the Lower Orinoco, are entirely 
wanting, as we were told, in the Rio Paragua (or Upp e 
nnoco, between San Fernando and the Esmeralda). Thes^ 
are very remarkable differences in the nature of the ''vate*'^ 
and the distribution of animals. The Indians do not 
to mention them, when they would prove to travellers tba 
the Upper Orinoco, to the east of San Fernando, i® 
distinct river which falls into the Orinoco, and that t 
real origin of the latter must be sought in the sources 
the Guaviare. 
Acesines. The Sutlej or Hysudrns forms, together with the Beyah^ 
Hyphases, the river Gun. a. These are the beautiful regions oi ^ 
Punjab and Dcuab, celebrated from the time of Alexander to 
present day 
