BBIDSE OB I/IATTAS. 
461 
the columns of Hercules, beyond which no white man has 
been able to penetrate. It appears, that this point, known 
by the name of the great Baudal de Guaharibos, is three- 
quarters of a degree west of Esmeralda, consequently in 
longitude 67° 38'. A military expedition, undertaken by 
the commander of the fort of San Carlos, Hon Erancisco 
Bovadilla, to discover the sources of the Orinoco, led to some 
information respecting the cataracts of the Ghiaharibos. 
Bovadilla had heard, that some fugitive negroes from Dutch 
Guiana, proceeding towards the west (beyond the isthmus 
between the sources of the Bio Carony and the Bio Branco), 
had joined the independent Indians. He attempted an en- 
train (hostile incursion), without having obtained the per- 
mission of the governor; the desire of procuring African 
slaves, better fitted for labour than the copper-coloured 
race, was a far more powerful motive than that of zeal for 
the progress of geography. Bovadilla arrived without diffi- 
culty as far as the little Baudal* opposite the Gehette; but 
having advanced to the foot of the rocky dike that forms 
the great cataract, he was suddenly attacked, while ho was 
breakfasting, by the Guaharibos and Guaycas, two warlike 
tribes, celebrated for the viruleuce of the curare with which 
their arrows arc empoisoned. The Indians occupied the 
rocks that rise in the middle of the river, and seeing the 
Spaniards without bows, and having no knowledge of fire- 
arms, they provoked the whites, whom they believed to be 
without defence. Several of the latter were dangerously 
wounded, and Bovadilla found himself forced to give the 
signal for battle. A. fearful carnage ensued among the 
natives, but none of the Dutch negroes, who, as was be- 
lieved, had taken refuge in those parts, were found. Not- 
withstanding a victory so easily won, the Spaniards did not 
dare to advance eastward in a mountainous country, and 
along a river inclosed by very high banks. 
These white Guaharibos have constructed a bridge of 
lianas above the cataract, supported on rocks that rise, as 
generally happens in the pongos of the Upper Maranon, in 
the middle of the river. The existence of this bridge, 
* It is called Randal de abated (Low Cataract), in opposition to the 
great Randal de Gnaharibos } which is situated higher up toward thr 
*ast. 
