the West Indies, are the Wikiri,
Saymi, and the rest before spoken of, all mortal enemies to the
Spaniards. On the south side of the main mouth of Orenoque are the
Arwacas; and beyond them, the Cannibals; and to the south of them, the
Amazons.

To make mention of the several beasts, birds, fishes, fruits, flowers,
gums, sweet woods, and of their several religions and customs, would for
the first require as many volumes as those of Gesnerus, and for the
next another bundle of Decades. The religion of the Epuremei is the same
which the Ingas, emperors of Peru, used, which may be read in Cieza and
other Spanish stories; how they believe the immortality of the soul,
worship the sun, and bury with them alive their best beloved wives and
treasure, as they likewise do in Pegu in the East Indies, and other
places. The Orenoqueponi bury not their wives with them, but their
jewels, hoping to enjoy them again. The Arwacas dry the bones of their
lords, and their wives and friends drink them in powder. In the graves
of the Peruvians the Spaniards found their greatest abundance of
treasure. The like, also, is to be found among these people in every
province. They have all many wives, and the lords five-fold to the
common sort. Their wives never eat with their husbands, nor among
the men, but serve their husbands at meals and afterwards feed by
themselves. Those that are past their younger years make all their bread
and drink, and work their cotton-beds, and do all else of service and
labour; for the men do nothing but hunt, fish, play, and drink, when
they are out of the wars.

I will enter no further into discourse of their manners, laws, and
customs. And because I have not myself seen the cities of Inga I cannot
avow on my credit what I have heard, although it be very likely that the
emperor Inga hath built and erected as magnificent palaces in Guiana as
his ancestors did in Peru; which were for their riches and rareness most
marvellous, and exceeding all in Europe, and, I think, of the world,
China excepted, which also the Spaniards, which I had, assured me to be
true, as also the nations of the borderers, who, being but savages to
those of the inland, do cause much treasure to be buried with them.
For I was informed of one of the caciques of the valley of Amariocapana
which had buried with him a little before our arrival a chair of gold
most curiously wrought, which was made either in Macureguarai adjoining
or in Manoa. But if