The day after passing the place where the white man lived you see a creek
on the left hand, and shortly after the path to the open country. Here
you drag the canoe up into the forest, and leave it there. Your baggage
must now be carried by the Indians. The creek you passed in the river
intersects the path to the next settlement: a large mora has fallen
across it, and makes an excellent bridge. After walking an hour and a
half you come to the edge of the forest, and a savanna unfolds itself to
the view.

The finest park that England boasts falls far short of this delightful
scene. There are about two thousand acres of grass, with here and there
a clump of trees, and a few bushes and single trees scattered up and down
by the hand of Nature. The ground is neither hilly nor level, but
diversified with moderate rises and falls, so gently running into one
another that the eye cannot distinguish where they begin, nor where they
end, while the distant black rocks have the appearance of a herd at rest.
Nearly in the middle there is an eminence, which falls off gradually on
every side; and on this the Indians have erected their huts.

To the northward of them the forest forms a circle, as though it had been
done by art; to the eastward it hangs in festoons; and to the south and
west it rushes in abruptly, disclosing a new scene behind it at every
step as you advance along.

This beautiful park of nature is quite surrounded by lofty hills, all
arrayed in superbest garb of trees; some in the form of pyramids, others
like sugar-loaves towering one above the other; some rounded off, and
others as though they had lost their apex. Here two hills rise up in
spiral summits, and the wooded line of communication betwixt them sinks
so gradually that it forms a crescent; and there the ridges of others
resemble the waves of an agitated sea. Beyond these appear others, and
others past them; and others still farther on, till they can scarcely be
distinguished from the clouds.

There are no sand-flies, nor bete-rouge, nor mosquitos in this pretty
spot. The fire-flies during the night vie in numbers and brightness with
the stars in the firmament above: the air is pure, and the north-east
breeze blows a refreshing gale throughout the day. Here the
white-crested maroudi, which is never found in the Demerara, is pretty
plentiful; and here grows the tree which produces the moran, sometimes
called balsam capivi.

Your route lies south