country and people, both semi-civilized and savage; and as my
journal grew, I began to think that on my return at some future
time to Caracas, it might prove useful and interesting to the
public, and also procure me fame; which thought proved
pleasurable and a great incentive, so that I began to observe
things more narrowly and to study expression. But the book was
not to be.

From the mouth of the Meta I journeyed on, intending to visit the
settlement of Atahapo, where the great River Guaviare, with other
rivers, empties itself into the Orinoco. But I was not destined
to reach it, for at the small settlement of Manapuri I fell ill
of a low fever; and here ended the first half-year of my
wanderings, about which no more need be told.

A more miserable place than Manapuri for a man to be ill of a low
fever in could not well be imagined. The settlement, composed of
mean hovels, with a few large structures of mud, or plastered
wattle, thatched with palm leaves, was surrounded by water,
marsh, and forest, the breeding-place of myriads of croaking
frogs and of clouds of mosquitoes; even to one in perfect health
existence in such a place would have been a burden. The
inhabitants mustered about eighty or ninety, mostly Indians of
that degenerate class frequently to be met with in small trading
outposts. The savages of Guayana are great drinkers, but not
drunkards in our sense, since their fermented liquors contain so
little alcohol that inordinate quantities must be swallowed to
produce intoxication; in the settlements they prefer the white
man's more potent poisons, with the result that in a small place
like Manapuri one can see enacted, as on a stage, the last act in