CRUELTY TO A SLATE. 
515 
Jose de Itumaga founded the Pueblo de Ciudad heal, which 
still figures on the most modern maps, though it has not 
existed for fifty years past, on account of the insalubrity of 
its situation. Beyond the point where the Orinoco turns to 
the east, forests are constantly seen on the right bank and 
the llanos or steppes of Venezuela outlie left. The forests 
which border the river, are not however so thick as those of 
the Upper Orinoco. The population, which augments per- 
ceptibly as you advance toward the capital, comprises but 
lew Indians, and is composed chiefly of whites, negroes and 
men of mixed descent. The number of the negroes is not 
great; but here, as everywhere else, the poverty of their 
masters does not tend to procure for them more humane 
treatment. An inhabitant of Caycara had just been con- 
demned to four years’ imprisonment, and a fine of one hun- 
dred piastres, for having, in a paroxysm of rage, tied a 
U f jF?i SB b .'T ^ lc to the tail of his horse, and dragged her 
at lull gallop through the savannah, till she expired. It is 
gratifying to record that the Audienoia was generally blamed 
in the country, for not having punished more severely so 
atrocious an action. Yet some few persons, who pretended 
to be the most enlightened and most sagacious of the com- 
munity, deemed the punishment of a white contrary to sound 
policy, at the moment when the blacks of St. Dotningo were 
in complete insurrection. Since I left those countries, civil 
dissensions have put arms into the hands of the slaves’; and 
fatal experience has led the inhabitants of Venezuela to 
regret that they refused to listen to Don Domingo Tovar 
and other right-thinking men, who, as early as the year 
1795, lifted up then- voices in the calildo of Caracas to pre- 
vent the introduction of blacks, and to propose means that 
might ammeliorate their condition. 
After having slept on the lOtli of June in an island in the 
middle of the river, (I believe that called Acaru by Father 
Caulin), we passed the mouth of the Bio Caura. This, the 
A ray and tho Oarony, are 'the largest tributary streams 
winch the Orinoco receives on its right bank. All the 
Christian settlements are near the mouth of the river; and 
the villages of San Pedro, Aripao, Urbani, and Guaragua- 
raico, succeed each other at the distance of a few leagues, 
lhe first and the most populous, contains only about two 
2 l 2 
