not think much of the hardships and perils of a voyage up the Magdalena, or even of the terrific passes of the Andes. We have been not a little amused, indeed, with the concise account he gives of his travelling baggage on starting from Cartagena, as contrasted with the directions given by Captain Cochrane to his good-eating-loving countrymen.

According to the travelling custom of Spanish Americans,' says M. Mollien, I had provided myself with a kettle, a frying-pan, and all the utensils and provisions not procurable on the road. I had also one of those beds brought from Spain, generally esteemed so very convenient, from their being contained in a small trunk, easily carried by the beast of burden.'

Now for Captain Cochrane's directions.

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In order to travel in this country, it is necessary to have a small bedstead, so constructed as to be easily taken to pieces, with a toldo or covering of tolerably strong linen, or blue check, in order to keep out the mosquitoes and small sand-flies; the threads of a common mosquito-net, as used in Barbadoes, not being sufficiently close to keep the sand-flies from entering. The traveller should likewise cure two or three dresses of Holland sheeting, with feet of the same material, instead of stockings, the jacket loose, and buttoned to the throat. Two straw hats are necessary; the one for lying down in the canoe, the other for various occasions: both should have broad brims. Shoes of strong Holland with leather soles, are most easy and agreeable to the feet, and a pair of English shooting-shoes for landing in the mud. A saddle with holsters is requisite; a sword, dirk, pair of pocket pistols; a hammock to recline in during the day; two good mats, one to lie on in the canoe, the other fitted to the sacking of the bed, to prevent the musquitoes from penetrating at night, are amongst other needful precautions. All wine, tea, coffee, chocolate, sugar, and salt, besides dried beef, hams, tongues, live fowls, eggs, and biscuits, with plenty of tocino, or cured pork, fat for frying eggs, should be laid in at this place, together with a sufficient stock of plaintains and dried salt meat for the bogas, who are fed, as well as paid by the traveller, and who, notwithstanding their abstemiousness at home, devour an astonishing quantity of provisions when living at the expense of others. The requisite cooking utensils are, a large copper chocolate-pot, a copper vessel for making soups, another for hashes and stews, a third flat one for frying eggs, two block-tin plates, three dishes, two tin cups for drinking, and small tin measure for serving spirits to the bogas, who will not work well, without a dram each morning, of the anise of the country, of which a jar or two must be provided, so as to supply them throughout the journey. Knives, forks, spoons, and small duck table-cloths about a yard square, must not be forgotten.' Vol. I. pp. 86-88.

With all these provident arrangements, however, a voyage of six or seven weeks up the Magdalena, in the miserable pira-¿

guas or champans (canoes or barges) of the country, slowly poled along against the current by the rascally bogas, scorched by the beams of a tropical sun by day, and kept waking by the mosquitoes at night,-to say nothing of the danger of being upset by the rapids, devoured by alligators in bathing, or bitten by serpents on landing,-this river-voyage is, we say, extremely unlike a trip to Leith or Boulogne in a trim yacht or well-provided steam-packet. The distance to be navigated, is only 160 leagues, which, in descending the river, may be accomplished with ease in seven days, while it takes from thirty to eight and forty days to reach Honda from the coast. Our ⚫ mercurial Frenchman was not a little annoyed by this frightful navigation. The heat, the deep solitude that prevails on the unhealthy shores of the river, peopled for the most part only with jaguars, howling monkeys, parrots, and alligators, together with the black forms which are occasionally seen in the few scattered hamlets, or paddling their hollow trees, transported him in imagination to the Senegal. As to the poor inhabitants of the shore, out of the ten plagues of Egypt,' he says, they have at least five; putrid water, ulcers, reptiles, large flies, and the death of their first-born,-for, in fact, they 'rear their children with great difficulty.'

• On both sides of the Magdalena, a few isolated cottages constructed with reeds, and containing a sickly and feeble population composed of different races, are the sole asylums in these desolate regions. Thus, while, in Africa, the negroes congregate in small communities to defend themselves against the invasions of their neighbours, in these countries, the inhabitants pass their days remote from one another; a few cows constituting their whole fortune, the wine of their palm-trees their sole consolation.'

If, dismayed at the perils of the navigation, the Traveller should determine on landing at La Guayra or Puerto Cabello, and taking the Valencia road, the distance is from 290 to 310 leagues (according to which port he starts from); and though it may be accomplished in between fifty and sixty days, and is therefore as short, in point of time, as the other route, it may be as well to forewarn him what sort of road he will have to travel in crossing the Andes. Some of the paramos (as the lower summits of the Andes are called) are much dreaded by the natives themselves, on account of the severity of the cold or rarity of the atmosphere on their summits. They regard these spots,' says the Author of " Letters from Colombia," with a respect almost amounting to awe.' He travelled at a very favourable period, and suffered no other inconvenience than fatigue and chapped lips; but the dangers are not, he says, imaginary. In crossing the paramo of Almocadero, south of

Pamplona, many a traveller has perished, and lies buried on the summit. He saw human bones scattered about, and some hundred rude crosses erected by the passing traveller either to commemorate a friend who had been emparamado, (fallen a victim to the paramo), or as a grateful offering at his escaping the danger.' But Captain Cochrane gives an account of the passage of a division of the patriot army over the mountains separating the plains of Casanare from the province of Tunja, which is truly horrible.

This force did not exceed fifteen hundred men, included in which, one hundred and fifty British were all that could be mustered capable of undertaking this march, out of the three hundred and fifty, of which the battalion was composed on its first arrival,-some few having dropped down dead on the line of march from mere exhaustion, and others having been rendered unserviceable by the bite of a fish called the carib, or raya, which tears off one or two pounds of the fleshy part of the thighs or calves of the legs of the soldiers, as they wade through the rivers in the plains; the army had upwards of a hundred men thus disabled in passing one very inconsiderable stream in which these fish abounded. Some were unable to proceed from enormous ulcers, which had carried away some of their toes, and which threatened others with the total loss of feet, or legs. These ulcers were brought on by general debility of body, from bad food, from jiggers, from having to march barefooted, sometimes whole days together, over plains covered with the sensitive plant, the thorns of which buried themselves in the soles of their feet; or from the feet and legs, after wading rivers, being exposed wet to the scorching heat of the sun. These persons were obliged to be left in the small villages through which the army occasionally passed. All were now barefooted, and almost naked, for few had more than a jacket and cap, and many were entirely without blankets; as they had, during the time the dysentery was upon them, either thrown away, or bartered for a little tobacco or perhaps water, all their spare necessaries, or had been robbed of them by their expert and necessitous companions. Thus, in four months, were these poor fellows reduced almost to the last state of misery, without even the consolation of having been of service to those whom they came to assist, not having as yet met the enemy; but, on the contrary, being despised and detested by their companions in arms as a useless burthen, or, as they expressed themselves, not worth the meat they consumed..

'But the cup of misery was not yet full; two-thirds of these lastnamed unfortunates were still doomed to witness the other third perish on one day's march, not in the field of honour, for which they had so long and so ardently wished, and even prayed, but, like frantic maniacs, on the summit of the Andes, on what is called by the natives the Paramo of Chisba. On this Paramo the air is so exceedingly rarefied, that it is very difficult to breathe, and those who are affected by it (or

emparamados) become benumbed, froth at the mouth, and lose their senses, tear out their hair, and bereft of every sense of feeling by degrees, ultimately die. The natives recommend eating sugar and drinking water in preference to spirits, on passing these places; and flagellation to those who shew symptoms of being affected, not letting them stop for an instant. Ignorance at the time of these remedies, and all except the flagellation being out of their power, fifty Englishmen, and two officers, and upwards of a hundred of the native troops, fell sacrifices, without the possibility of assistance being given to them. Out of five thousand horses and mules, there did not remain enough to transport the ammunition: which was obliged to be carried on the backs of Indians, natives of villages on either side the Paramo, who through custom were able to carry on their backs or heads, one hundred and fifty pounds weight, over these bad roads. The roads, (if the beds of small mountain streams or deep morasses may be so termed, for these were no other,) for several days before the army arrived at the Paramo, were literally strewed with, and in some places impeded by, dead, dying, tired, broken-backed, or broken-legged horses and mules, besides saddles, bridles, baggage, &c.; some of these poor animals having fallen alive down precipices, at the bottom of which there was neither food nor water, must have been starved to death. In short, the army appeared more like one flying, anxious only to preserve life, from a victorious and cruel enemy, than one on its march to attack more than three times its own number of well-disciplined and appointed troops.

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Forty-three days had been spent in this wretched and harassing manner, under incessant rain, in passing those mountains, when they (being in all about nine hundred infantry and two hundred dismounted cavalry) at length entered the kingdom of New Grenada, where they found the enemy was preparing to receive them with three thousand infantry, six hundred cavalry, and two pieces of artillery; for at last he had been convinced that this miserable force had really come with the intention of invading his territory; and must have been Divine Providence that kept him incredulous so long for had he placed but a small part of his force at the foot of the Paramo, the patriots must have fallen an easy prey, as many, particularly the British, were obliged to leave their musquets to be brought in by the Indians, in order to save their lives. But how is it possible to describe the joy of these poor wretches on leaving the horrible mountains, and on entering the beautiful and fertile valleys of the province of Tunja. The very climate was changed, and had become an agreeable medium between the intense heat of the plains, and the bitter cold of the mountains. It had also ceased to rain. On every side, as they descended the last mountains, were to be seen little villages, with their corn-fields, potatoe fields, &c. ;—it was in fact, to them an entrance into an earthly paradise.'

Vol. I. pp. 478-484.

The road from Honda to Bogota, though a distance of only twenty-two leagues, is a sufficiently formidable four day's

journey. The Author of the journeyed from Caracas to the paramo of Cerradera as ⚫ constantly mounting or descending on a rough pavement torn up by the violence of the mountain torrent, and totally neglected since its first formation. The mules with the utmost difficulty keep their footing, having to jump from one mass to another at the imminent risk of the rider's neck; or, on the other hand, where the road has not been paved, deep ruts are formed by the constant traffic in wet weather, in which, at every step, the animals are immersed up to their girths. As an agrément de plus, it rained incessantly for three hours during this stage; and I was thrice unhorsed in descending, (the last time in a bog,) in consequence of having lost my crupper. There are some terrible passes between Caracas and Bogota, but none to compete with this road from the capital to the point of embarkation on the Magdalena, probably the most frequented in the country.'

Letters from Colombia, who had Bogota, speaks of the road over actually appalling. You are

The passage of the Quindiu is considered, however, as the most difficult in the Andes. Humboldt represents it as impracticable on mules. The usual mode of travelling is in a chair, strapped to the backs of the native porters (cargueros) or men of burden, who live by letting out their backs and loins to travellers on these occasions. Captain Cochrane, however, was advised to take a mule in preference: he did so, and repented of it.

'Almost immediately on leaving Ibague, we commenced ascending a mountain which overlooked the town to the south-west. I found the road particularly bad, being very steep, and so slippery, that the mules could scarcely keep their feet. To add to my comfort, on reaching a narrow pass, where the mountain rises perpendicularly on one side and a tremendous precipice is on the other, the owner of the mules, who had accompanied me thus far, exclaimed, "Ah! Sir, here I lost a valuable mule the other day; his foot slipped on this very spot, and falling down the precipice, he broke his neck." Fortunately for me, my mule shewed more sense, and carried me past in safety. The poor cargueros began to feel the fatigue of climbing the mountains, being frequently obliged to rest themselves; but they said they should do better the next day, as the first day was always most trying to them. On either side of the road, I saw a number of red-haired monkeys leaping from tree to tree, who scrutinized us closely, but appeared very harmless............

• As we ascended, I soon found the inconvenience of a mule, and the advantage of the sillero, as Malarino went on before me extremely well and quite dry; whilst I was left behind, and, in a few minutes, had my feet wet, my mule being up to the girths in mud, and in momentary danger of stumbling or sticking fast in the mire. The road was originally formed by the Old Spaniards, about eight feet broad, with trees laid equally together and well secured, affording a