islands Congrejos and del Burro with the bocas chicas of Lauran,
Nuina, and Mariusas. As the Isla del Burro disappears in the time of
great inundations, it is unhappily not suited to fortifications. The
southern bank of the brazo Imataca is cut by a labyrinth of little
channels, into which the Rio Imataca and the Rio Aquire flow. A long
series of little granitic hills rises in the fertile savannahs between
the Imataca and the Cuyuni; it is a prolongation of the Cordilleras of
Parima, which, bounding the horizon south of Angostura, forms the
celebrated cataracts of the Rio Caroni, and approaches the Orinoco
like a projecting cape near the little fort of Vieja Guyana. The
populous missions of the Caribbee and Guiana Indians, governed by the
Catalonian Capuchins, lie near the sources of the Imataca and the
Aquire. The easternmost of these missions are those of Miamu, Camamu,
and Palmar, situate in a hilly country, which extends towards
Tupuquen, Santa Maria, and the Villa de Upata. Going up the Rio
Aquire, and directing your course across the pastures towards the
south, you reach the mission of Belem de Tumeremo, and thence the
confluence of the Curumu with the Rio Cuyuni, where the Spanish post
or destacamento de Cuyuni was formerly established. I enter into this
topographical detail because the Rio Cuyuni, or Cuduvini, runs
parallel to the Orinoco from west to east, through an extent of 2.5 or
3 degrees of longitude,* and furnishes an excellent natural boundary
between the territory of Caracas and that of English Guiana. (*
Including the Rio Juruam, one of the principal branches of the Cuyuni.
The Dutch military post is five leagues west of the union of Cuyuni
with the Essequibo, where the former river receives the Mazuruni.)

The two great branches of the Orinoco, the Zacupana and the Imataca,
remain separate for fourteen leagues: on going up farther, the waters
of the river are found united* in a single channel extremely broad. (*