8 
GUATEMALA. 
mala and Salvador), and even after the dry season is of 
large volume, thirty miles from its mouth attaining a 
breadth of more than six hundred feet and a depth of 
ten feet, which is nearly twenty-seven when the floods 
of the rainy season occur. If it were not for the bar, 
which has hardly a fathom of water, the navigation 
would develop rich lands on either bank. The Rio Paz, 
the Rio de los Esclavos, and the Rio Michatoya are not 
navigable, although formerly the latter stream at its 
mouth (Istapa) was large enough within the bar to admit 
the construction of vessels of moderate size; it was here 
that the Spaniards fitted out several fleets. 
Far different are some of the rivers that find their way 
into the Atlantic. Chief among them all is the noble 
Usumacinta, which flows into the Gulf of Mexico through 
the Lago de Terminos, and is navigable many miles 
through a singularly fertile and interesting country, as 
beautiful as fancy pictures the cradle of the human race, 
— a land seldom visited by white men, and the home of 
the unconquered and unbaptized (La Candones) Indios. 
The swift Chixoy, the Rio de la Pasion, and the almost 
unknown San Pedro unite to form this “ Child of many 
Waters/’ 
The Belize River, rising in the Montana de Dolores near 
Peten and crossing the British colony, is the principal 
highway for the commerce of Peten, the pitpans bringing 
down huge mahogany bowls, paddles, baskets, and other 
Indian goods. The Sarstun forms the southern boun¬ 
dary of the British possessions, and is navigable for 
small canoes as far as the rapids of Gracias a Dios. 
None but timber-cutters disturb its solitudes. The Polochic 
is at present the most useful river of Guatemala. It 
