and
tired, were ready to give up the ghost; for we had now come from the
galley near forty miles.

At the last we determined to hang the pilot; and if we had well known
the way back again by night, he had surely gone. But our own necessities
pleaded sufficiently for his safety; for it was as dark as pitch, and
the river began so to narrow itself, and the trees to hang over from
side to side, as we were driven with arming swords to cut a passage
through those branches that covered the water. We were very desirous to
find this town hoping of a feast, because we made but a short breakfast
aboard the galley in the morning, and it was now eight o'clock at night,
and our stomachs began to gnaw apace; but whether it was best to return
or go on, we began to doubt, suspecting treason in the pilot more and
more; but the poor old Indian ever assured us that it was but a little
further, but this one turning and that turning; and at the last about
one o'clock after midnight we saw a light, and rowing towards it we
heard the dogs of the village. When we landed we found few people; for
the lord of that place was gone with divers canoas above 400 miles off,
upon a journey towards the head of Orenoque, to trade for gold, and to
buy women of the Cannibals, who afterwards unfortunately passed by us as
we rode at an anchor in the port of Morequito in the dark of the night,
and yet came so near us as his canoas grated against our barges; he left
one of his company at the port of Morequito, by whom we understood that
he had brought thirty young women, divers plates of gold, and had great
store of fine pieces of cotton cloth, and cotton beds. In his house we
had good store of bread, fish, hens, and Indian drink, and so rested
that night; and in the morning, after we had traded with such of his
people as came down, we returned towards our galley, and brought with us
some quantity of bread, fish, and hens.

On both sides of this river we passed the most beautiful country that
ever mine eyes beheld; and whereas all that we had seen before was
nothing but woods, prickles, bushes, and thorns, here we beheld plains
of twenty miles in length, the grass short and green, and in divers
parts groves of trees by themselves, as if they had been by all the art
and labour in the world so made of purpose; and still as we rowed, the
deer came down feeding by the water's side as if they had been used to
a keeper's call. Upon this river there were great store