over an area of 192,000 square miles, and includes within its circuit the basins of the Corentyn, Essequibo, and Orinoco—a circumstance that enables us to judge of the former population of this portion of the continent.” Remarkable relics of a former culture, consisting of granitic vessels ornamented with beautiful representations of labyrinths, and the earthenware forms resembling the Roman masks, have been discovered among the wild Indians on the Mosquito coast.[HU] I had them engraved in the picturesque Atlas appended to the historical portion of my travels. Antiquarians are astonished at the resemblance of these _algreco_ vessels to those which embellish the Palace of Mitla (near Oaxaca, in New Spain). The large-nosed race, who are so frequently sculptured in relief on the Palenque of Guatimala and in Aztec pictures, I have never observed in Peruvian carvings. Klaproth recollects having noticed that the Chalkas, a horde of Northern Mongolia, had similar large noses. It is universally known, that many races of the North American, Canadian, and copper-coloured Indians, have fine aquiline noses, which constitute an essential physiognomical mark of distinction between them and the present inhabitants of New Granada, Quito, and Peru. Are the large-eyed, fair-skinned natives of the north-west coast of America, of whom Marchand speaks as living in 54° and 58° north lat., descended from the Usuns, an Alano-Gothic race of Central Asia? Footnote 52: p. 20.—“_Deal certain death with a poisoned thumb-nail._” The Otomacs frequently poison their thumb-nails with _curare_. The mere impress of the nail proves fatal, should the curare become mixed with the blood. We have in our possession the creeping plant, from the juice of which the curare is prepared, in the Esmeralda Mission, on the Upper Orinoco, but, unfortunately, we did not find the plant when in blossom. From its physiognomy, it seems to be allied to _Strychnos_.[HV]