"There were, along the whole coast of the Spanish Main, rumours of an inland country which abounded with gold. These rumours undoubtedly related to the kingdoms of Bogota and Tunja, now the Nuevo Reyno de Granada. Belalcazar, who was in quest of this country from Quito, Federman, who came from Venezuela, and Gonzalo Ximenez de Quesada, who sought it by way of the River Madalena, and who effected its conquest, met here. But in these countries also there were rumours of a rich land at a distance; similar accounts prevailed in Peru; in Peru they related to the Nuevo Reyno, there they related to Peru; and thus adventurers from both sides were allured to continue the pursuit after the game was taken. An imaginary kingdom was soon shaped out as the object of their quest, and stories concerning it were not more easily invented than believed. It was said that a younger brother of Atabalipa fled, after the destruction of the Incas, took with him the main part of their treasures, and founded a greater empire than that of which his family had been deprived. Sometimes the imaginary Emperor was called the Great Paytite, sometimes the Great Moxo, sometimes the Enim or Great Paru. An impostor at Lima affirmed that he had been in his capital, the city of Manoa, where not fewer than 3,000 workmen were employed in the silversmiths' street; he even produced a map of the country, in which he had marked a hill of gold, another of silver, and a third of salt. ... This imaginary kingdom obtained the name of El Dorado from the fashion of its Lord, which has the merit of being in savage costume. His body was anointed every morning with a certain fragrant gum of great price, and gold dust was then blown upon him, through a tube, till he was covered with it: the whole was washed off at night. This the barbarian thought a more magnificent and costly attire than could be afforded by any other potentate in the world, and hence the Spaniards called him El Dorado, or the Gilded One. A history of all the expeditions which were undertaken for the conquest of his kingdom would form a volume not less interesting than extraordinary." _R. Southey, History of Brazil, volume 1, chapter 12._