n rolled himself in gold dust until he became a "gilded king." Then,
embarking in a canoe with his nobles, he was paddled to the centre of
the lake, crowds of people thronging its shores and honouring him with
songs and the din of rude instrumental music. Offerings to the god of
the lake were made from the canoe, gold, emeralds, pearls, and
everything precious being scattered upon the water. Finally, the Cacique
jumped in himself and washed the gold from his body, while the people
shouted for joy. To wind up the festival a great drinking bout was held,
when canoesful of piwarree, the Indian's beer, were drunk, and every one
made merry.

Such was the tradition--for the ceremony had been discontinued half a
century before--which had so impressed itself over the northern shores
of South America, as to be told from the Amazon to the isthmus of
Darien. "El Dorado" was gilded every morning, and his city was full of
beautiful golden palaces. It stood on the edge of the great salt lake
Parima, the sands of which were composed of the precious metal. Some
went so far as to say that they had seen the glittering city from a
distance, and were only prevented from reaching it by the peculiar
difficulties of the way. Not to mention tigers and alligators,
starvation and sickness, there were "anthropophagoi and men whose heads
do grow beneath their shoulders," besides amazons and fiery dragons.
Wherever the story was told the golden city was located at a far
distance, and it seemed ever to recede before the eager seekers. They
sought it in the forest and on the savannah, over the lofty peaks of the
Andes, and along the banks of the mighty rivers. The whole of the
Spanish Main was explored, and places then visited which have hardly
been seen again by the white man down to the present date.

The quest began in New Granada, and from thence it shifted to Venezuela.
The most daring seekers were German knights, the Welsers of Augsburg.
They had received charters from Charles the Fifth, under which they
were empowered to found cities, erect forts, work mines, and make slaves
of the Indians. One of their representatives, Ambrosio de Alfinger, set
out in 1530, accompanied by two hundred Spaniards, and a larger number
of Indians, laden with provisions and other necessaries. On the journey
the party committed such brutalities upon the poor natives that the
reports afterwards helped to fire the blood of Englishmen, and make them
bitterly cruel. To