Dorado, and, as Berreo informed me, upon this occasion, those Guianians,
and also the borderers, and all other in that tract which I have seen,
are marvellous great drunkards; in which vice I think no nation can
compare with them; and at the times of their solemn feasts, when the
emperor carouseth with his captains, tributaries, and governors, the
manner is thus. All those that pledge him are first stripped naked and
their bodies anointed all over with a kind of white balsamum (by them
called curca), of which there is great plenty, and yet very dear amongst
them, and it is of all other the most precious, whereof we have had good
experience. When they are anointed all over, certain servants of the
emperor, having prepared gold made into fine powder, blow it through
hollow canes upon their naked bodies, until they be all shining from
the foot to the head; and in this sort they sit drinking by twenties
and hundreds, and continue in drunkenness sometimes six or seven days
together. The same is also confirmed by a letter written into Spain
which was intercepted, which Master Robert Dudley told me he had seen.
Upon this sight, and for the abundance of gold which he saw in the city,
the images of gold in their temples, the plates, armours, and shields of
gold which they use in the wars, he called it El Dorado.

After the death of Ordas and Martinez, and after Orellana, who was
employed by Gonzalo Pizarro, one Pedro de Orsua, a knight of Navarre,
attempted Guiana, taking his way into Peru, and built his brigandines
upon a river called Oia, which riseth to the southward of Quito, and
is very great. This river falleth into Amazons, by which Orsua with
his companies descended, and came out of that province which is called
Motilones ("friars"--Indians so named from their cropped heads); and
it seemeth to me that this empire is reserved for her Majesty and the
English nation, by reason of the hard success which all these and other
Spaniards found in attempting the same, whereof I will speak briefly,