132 
THE UPPER ORINOCO. 
of the rivers. This phenomenon, which will one day he so 
important for the political connections of nations, unques- 
tionably deserves to be carefully examined. 
Chapter XXIV. 
The Upper Orinoco, from Esmeralda to the confluence of the Guaviare. — ■ 
Second passage across the Cataracts of Atures and Maypures. — The 
Lower Orinoco, between the mouth of the Rio Apure, and Angostura 
the capital of Spanish Guiana. 
Opposite to the point where the Orinoco forms its bifur- 
cation, the granitic group of Duida rises in an amphitheatre 
on the right bank of the river. This mountain, which the 
missionaries call a volcano, is nearly eight thousand feet 
high. It is perpendicular on the south and west, and has 
an aspect of solemn grandeur. Its summit is bare and 
stony, but, wherever its less steep declivities are covered 
with mould vast forests appear suspended on its flanks. At 
the foot of Duida is the mission of Esmeralda, a little 
hamlet with eighty inhabitants, surrounded by a lovely 
plain, intersected by rills of black but limpid water. This 
plain is adorned with clumps of the mauritia palm, the sago- 
tree of America. Nearer the mountain, the distance of 
which from the cross of the mission I found to be seven 
thousand three hundred toises, the marshy plain changes to 
a savannah, and spends itself along the lower region of the 
Cordillera. Large pine-apples are there found of a delicious 
flavour; that species of bromclia always grows solitary 
among the gramina, like our Colchicum autumnale, while 
the B. karatas, another species of the same genus, is a social 
plant, Hkc our whortleberries and heaths. The pine-apples 
of Esmeralda are cultivated throughout Guiana. There arc 
certain spots m America, as in Europe, where different 
fruits attain their highest perfection. The sapota-pli'.in 
(achra) should be eaten at the Island of Margareta or at 
Cumana: the chiriinoya (very different from the custard- 
apple and sweet-sop of the West India Islands) at Loxa in 
Peru; the grenadilla, or parcha, at Caracas; and the pine- 
apple at Esmeralda, or in the island of Cuba. The pine- 
