348 
AFFECTING INCIDENT. 
carelessly guarded in the caravanserai. Her arms being 
-wounded, the Indians of Javita bad loosened ber bonds, 
unknown to the missionary and tbe alcaldes. Having suc- 
ceeded by tbe help of her teeth in breaking them entirely, 
she disappeared during the night ; and at the fourth sunrise 
was seen at the mission of San Fernando, hovering around 
tbe hut where her children were confined. “ What that 
woman performed,” added the missionary, who gave us 
this sad narrative, “the most robust Indian would not 
have ventured to undertake !” She traversed the woods at 
a season when the sky is constantly covered with clouds, 
and the sun during whole days appears but for a few 
minutes. Hid the course of the waters direct ber way? 
Tbe inundations of the rivers forced her to go far from the 
banks of the main stream, through the midst of woods 
where the movement of the water is almost imperceptible. 
How often must she have been stopped by the thorny 
lianas, that form a network around the trunks they en- 
twine ! How often must she have swum across the rivulets 
that run into the Atabapo ! This unfortunate woman was 
asked how she had sustained herself during four days. She 
said that, exhausted with fatigue, she could find no other 
nourishment than those great black ants called vachacos, 
which climb the trees in long bands, to suspend on them 
their resinous nests. We pressed the missionary to tell 
us whether the G uahiba had peacefully enjoyed the hap- 
piness of remaining with her children ; and if any repen- 
tance had followed this excess of cruelty. He would not 
satisfy our curiosity ; but at our return from the Bio 
Hegro we learned that the Indian mother was again sepa- 
rated from her children, and sent to one of the missions of 
the ITpper Orinoco. There she died, refusing all kind of 
nourishment, as savages frequently do in great calamities. 
Such is the remembrance annexed to this fatal rock, the 
Piedra de la Madre. In this relation of my travels I feel 
no desire to dwell on pictures of individual suffering — • 
evils which are frequent wherever there are masters and 
slaves, civilized Europeans living with people in a state of 
barbarism, and priests exercising the plenitude of arbitrary 
power over men ignorant and without defence. In describing 
the countries through which I passed, I generally confine 
