PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
I offer this book of •“ Wanderings ” with a hesitating 
hand. It has little merit, and must make its way through 
the world as well as it can. It will receive many a jostle 
as it goes along, and perhaps is destined to add one more 
to the number of slain, in the field of modern criticism. 
But if it fall, it may still, in death, be useful to me ; for, 
should some accidental rover take it up, and, in turning 
over its pages, imbibe the idea of going out to explore 
Guiana, in order to give the world an enlarged description 
of that noble country, I shall say, “fortem ad fortia misi,” 
and demand the armour; that is, I shall lay claim to a 
certain portion of the honours he will receive, upon the 
plea, that I was the first mover of his discoveries; for, as 
Ulysses sent Achilles to Troy, so I sent him to Guiana. I 
intended to have written much more at length ; but days, 
and months, and years, have passed away, and nothing 
has been done. Thinking it very probable that I shall 
never have patience enough to sit down and write a full 
account of all I saw and examined in those remote wilds, 
I give up the intention of doing so, and send forth this 
