The Steppes of Caracas abound in flocks of the so-called _Cervus mexicanus_. This stag when young is spotted, and resembles the roe. We have frequently met with perfectly white varieties, which is a very striking fact when the high temperature of this zone is taken into consideration. The _Cervus mexicanus_ is not found on the declivities of the Andes in the equatorial region, at an elevation exceeding from 4476 to 5115 feet, but another white deer, which I could scarcely distinguish by any one specific characteristic from the European species, ascends to an elevation of nearly 13,000 feet. The _Cavia capybara_ is known in the province of Caracas by the name of _Chiguire_. This unfortunate animal is pursued in the water by the crocodile, and on land by the tiger or jaguar. It runs so badly that we were often able to catch it with our hands. The extremities are smoked and eaten as hams, but have a most unpleasant taste, owing to the flavour and smell of musk by which they are impregnated; and on the Orinoco we gladly ate monkey-hams in preference. These beautifully striped animals—the _Viverra mapurito_, _Viverra zorilla_, and _Viverra vittata_—exhale a fetid odour. Footnote 31: p. 12—“_The Guaranes and the fan-palm Mauritia._” The small coast tribe of the Guaranes (called in British Guiana, the Warraws, or Guaranos, and by the Caribs U-ara-u) inhabit not only the swampy delta and the river net-work of the Orinoco (more particularly the banks of the Manamo grande and the Caño Macareo), but also extend, with very slight differences in their mode of living, along the sea-shore, between the mouths of the Essequibo and the Boca de Navios of the Orinoco.[GN] According to the testimony of Schomburgk, the admirable observer referred to in the note, there are still about 1700 Warraus or Guaranos living in the vicinity of Cumaca, and along the banks of the Barime river, which empties itself into the gulf of the Boca de Navios. The social habits of the tribes settled in the delta of the Orinoco were known to the great historian Cardinal Bembo, the cotemporary of Christopher Columbus, Amerigo Vespucci, and Alonzo de Hojeda. He says[GO] _quibusdam in locis propter paludes incolæ domus in arboribus œdificant_. It is hardly probable that instead of the Guaranos at the mouth of the Orinoco, Bembo should here allude to the natives of the country near the mouth of the gulf of Maracaibo, where Alonzo de Hojeda, in August, 1499, (when accompanied by Vespucci and Juan de la Cosa) found a population having their dwellings _fondata sopra l’acqua come Venezia_ (“built like Venice on the water”).[GP] Vespucci, in the account of his travels, in which we meet with the first traces of the etymology of the name of the province of _Venezuela_ (Little Venice) as used for the province of Caracas, speaks only of houses built on a foundation of piles, and makes no mention of habitations in trees.