Chap. II. CANOE NAVIGATION ON THE LAKE. 27 
investigation was dispensed with. " Este cavaliero es 
botanista" — this gentleman is a botanist — cried the direc- 
tor, giving an order to leave my things unmolested. As 
far as I know the Spanish-American nations, scientific 
occupations are held in very high esteem amongst them— 
a trait of character worthy of a better fate than to be 
effaced by the brutalizing influences of continued revolu- 
tions and civil wars. It may be fairly said that this 
feature, originally belonging to the Spanish nationality, 
has been greatly developed and generalised, as to the 
colonial populations, by the travels and highly scientific 
researches of Baron Humboldt. 
Our passage up the river had taken us nine days, making 
an average progress of about twelve miles per day. Three 
days more were spent in crossing the lake. With the 
native boatmen it seems to be a rule to abstain from using 
oars, even when they are becalmed. Before we left the 
"aguas muertas" a small tree had been cut. This was 
now erected as a mast, a sail was spread, and slowly we 
began to move in the direction to Granada. Our naviga- 
tion was of a very primitive kind. At night, while every 
soul on board slept soundly, our bongo was left to find its 
own way, which, however, it refused to do, for when I 
awoke at dawn, I saw that we were heading to the place 
we had come from. By-and-bye, nevertheless, we drew 
nearer to our point of destination. When we had left the 
two peaks of Ometepe on one side, the summit of the 
Mombacho, designating the site of Granada, gradually rose 
from the water. We passed the island of Zapotera, cele- 
brated for its idols, which have been discovered and de- 
scribed by my friend, Mr. Squier. It is uninhabited, and 
may be said to be a mountain covered with a forest, here 
and there interrupted by a patch of savana. Like other 
