RTON.

REMARKS.

"Incertus, quo fata ferant, ubi sistera detur."

Kind and gentle reader, if the journey in quest of the wourali-poison has
engaged thy attention, probably thou mayst recollect that the traveller
took leave of thee at Fort St. Joachim, on the Rio Branco. Shouldst thou
wish to know what befell him afterwards, excuse the following
uninteresting narrative.

Having had a return of fever, and aware that the farther he advanced into
these wild and lonely regions the less would be the chance of regaining
his health, he gave up all idea of proceeding onwards, and went slowly
back towards the Demerara nearly by the same route he had come.

On descending the falls in the Essequibo, which form an oblique line
quite across the river, it was resolved to push through them, the
downward stream being in the canoe's favour. At a little distance from
the place a large tree had fallen into the river, and in the meantime the
canoe was lashed to one of its branches.

The roaring of the water was dreadful; it foamed and dashed over the
rocks with a tremendous spray, like breakers on a lee-shore, threatening
destruction to whatever approached it. You would have thought, by the
confusion it caused in the river, and the whirlpools it made, that Scylla
and Charybdis, and their whole progeny, had left the Mediterranean, and
come and settled here. The channel was barely twelve feet wide, and the
torrent in rushing down formed transverse furrows, which showed how near
the rocks were to the surface.

Nothing could surpass the skill of the Indian who steered the canoe. He
looked steadfastly at it, then at the rocks, then cast an eye on the
channel, and then looked at the canoe again. It was in vain to speak.
The sound was lost in the roar of waters; but his eye showed that he had
already passed it in imagination. He held up his paddle in a position,
as much as to say, that he would keep exactly amid channel; and then made
a sign to cut the bush rope that held the canoe to the fallen tree. The
canoe drove down the torrent with inconceivable rapidity. It did not
touch the rocks once all the way. The Indian proved to a nicety "medio
tutissimus ibis."

Shortly after this it rained almost day and night, the lightning flashing
incessantly, and the roar of thunder awful beyond expression.

The fever returned, and pressed so heavy on him, that to all appearance
his last day's march was over. However, it abated;