| OCR Text |
Show 180 CATARACTS OF TilE ORINOCO. Unlike the grander falls of Niagara (which are 140 French or 150 English feet high) the "Cataracts of Maypures" are not formed by the single precipitous descent of a vast mass of waters, nor are they "narrows" or passes through which the river rushes with accelerated velocity, as in the Pongo of Manseriche in the River of the Amazons. The Cataracts of Maypures consist of a countless number of little cascades succeeding each other like steps. The "Raudal" (the name given by the Spaniards to this species of cataract) is formed by numerous islands and rocks which so restrict the bed of the river, that out of a breadth of 8000 (8526 E.) feet there often only remains an open channel of twenty feet in width. The eastern side is now much more inaccessible and dangerous than the western. At the confluence of the Cameji with the Orinoco, goods are unladen, in order that the empty canoe, or, as it is here called, the Piragua, may be conveyed by Indians well acquainted with the Raudal to the mouth of the Toparo, where the danger is considered to be past. Where the separate rocks or steps (each of which is designated by a particular name) are not much above two or three feet high, the natives, if descending the stream, venture, remaining themselves in the canoe, to let it go down the falls; if they are ascending the stream, they leave the boat, swim forward, and when, after many unsuccessful attempts, they have succeeded in casting a rope round the points of rock which rise above the broken water, they draw up their vessel, which is often either overset or entirely filled with water in the course of these laborious proceedings. Sometimes, and it is the only case which gives the natives any uneasiness, the canoe is dashed in pieces against the rocks; the men have then to disengage themselves with bleeding bodies from the wreck and from the whirling force of the torrent, and to gain the shore by swimming. Where the rocky steps are very high and extend across the entire bed of the river, the light boat is brought to land and drawn along the bank by means of branches of trees placed under it as rollers. The most celebrated and difficult steps, those of Purimarimi and Manimi, are between nine and ten feet high. I found with astonishment, by barometric measurements (geodesicallevelling being out of |
