the insolent Spanish, it was in one of these that his son was
killed, and when he returned to England, the price was exacted and
paid. Sir Walter Raleigh was executed in the palace yard, Westminster,
and thus perished one who brought great glory to England by land and
sea.

Concerning El Dorado, Raleigh had given credence to no more than was
believed in his time by the Spanish of every port from San Marta on the
Caribbean to Quito on the Pacific. The old chronicles are full of it.
One instance, chosen almost at random from many of the same kind is
quoted by De Pons in his History of Caraccas.[10]

"When the wild Indian appeared before the Spanish governor of Guiana,
Don Manuel Centurion of Angostura, he was assailed with questions which
he answered with as much perspicuity and precision as could be expected
from one whose most intelligible language consisted in signs. He,
however, succeeded in making them understand that there was on the
border of Lake Parima a city whose inhabitants were civilized and
regularly disciplined to war. He boasted a great deal of the beauty of
its buildings, the neatness of its streets, the regularity of its
squares, and the riches of its people. According to him, the roofs of
its principal houses were either of gold or silver. The high-priest,
instead of pontifical robes, rubbed his whole body with the fat of the
turtle; then they blew upon it some gold dust, so as to cover his whole
body with it. In this attire, he performed the religious ceremonies.
The Indian sketched on a table with a bit of charcoal the city of which
he had given a description.

"His ingenuity seduced the governor. He asked him to serve as a guide
to some Spaniards he wished to send on this discovery, to which the
Indian consented. Sixty Spaniards offered themselves for the
undertaking, and among others Don Antonio Santos. They set off and
traveled nearly five hundred leagues to the south, through the most
frightful roads. Hunger, the swamps, the woods, the precipices, the
heat, the rains, destroyed almost all. When those who survived thought
themselves four or five days' journey from the capital city and hoped
to reach the end of all their troubles, and the object of their
desires, the Indian disappeared in the night.

"This event dismayed the Spaniards. They knew not where they were. By
degrees they all perished but Santos to whom it occurred to disguise
himself as an Indian. He threw off his cloth