The falls of Caroni, near Las Tablas, have been made famous by many travellers since the days of Raleigh, who was struck with the magnificent spectacle of their huge body of water descending a sheer 60 feet over black polished granite to join the greater river of which it is a tributary, after its hundreds of miles of comparatively quiet travel from the slopes of the Sierra Pacaraima, on the borders of Brazil. East of Caroni lie the two most populous districts of Bolivar, those of Piar and Roscio, containing numerous towns and fairly well provided with roads. The district of Heres has in the aggregate a larger population than either of the more easterly divisions, but over two-thirds of the whole of this is accounted for by the congregation of souls in the capital, so that from a general point of view the goldfield area is the most densely populated of all, and included 22,392 of the total of 55,744 in the State at the census of 1891. San Felix receives its second name of Las Tablas from the elevated plateau behind the town, over which the road climbs to the interior. It is a busy little town, though small, with an hotel, a few stores, telegraph office, and custom-house; the last is rather a coastguard-station, as we have seen that all duties are collected in Bolivar. There is a British consular agent in the port. With the enormous possibilities of the water-power present in the Caroni falls, it seems strange that the place has not developed ere this into a flourishing and important city, instead of the small terminus town that it remains. As it is, the size of the place is no criterion of its commercial standing, for all the imports and exports of the two eastern districts pass through San Felix, and the freight paid there amounts alone to £200,000 annually. Merchandise proceeds southwards on ox-wagons and mule-carts, which carry in cotton goods and hardware and bring back balatá and hides, with the small amount of gold at present produced. The 215 kilometres to Guasipati may take any time from ten days to two months for the wheel traffic, according to the kind used and the season of the year, for the “road” is exceedingly primitive. Bridges are rare, and the route is a mere track cut through the forest or winding over sandy plains, without any attempts at surveying, metalling, or draining, so that deep mud-holes are frequently formed, wherein the wagons may stick for two or three days before they are hauled out with block and tackle. In these circumstances it is not surprising that the ordinary traveller hires a mule for the journey from San Felix, and so covers the distance to Guasipati in about twenty-five hours’ actual riding.