the principal features of the different countries of the world,

as, for instance, the largest mountain ranges, and rivers, and
the cities. Also something, but very little, about the tribes of

savage men. She heard me with impatience, which made me speak
rapidly, in very general terms; and to simplify the matter I made

the world stand for the continent we were in. It seemed idle to
go beyond that, and her eagerness would not have allowed it.

"Tell me all you know," she said the moment I ceased speaking.
"What is there--and there--and there?" pointing in various

directions. "Rivers and forests--they are nothing to me. The
villages, the tribes, the people everywhere; tell me, for I must

know it all."
"It would take long to tell, Rima."

"Because you are so slow. Look how high the sun is! Speak,
speak! What is there?" pointing to the north.

"All that country," I said, waving my hands from east to west,
"is Guayana; and so large is it that you could go in this

direction, or in this, travelling for months, without seeing the
end of Guayana. Still it would be Guayana; rivers, rivers,

rivers, with forests between, and other forests and rivers
beyond. And savage people, nations and tribes--Guahibo,

Aguaricoto, Ayano, Maco, Piaroa, Quiriquiripo, Tuparito--shall I
name a hundred more? It would be useless, Rima; they are all

savages, and live widely scattered in the forests, hunting with
bow and arrow and the zabatana. Consider, then, how large

Guayana is!"
"Guayana--Guayana! Do I not know all this is Guayana? But

beyond, and beyond, and beyond? Is there no end to Guayana?"
"Yes; there northwards it ends at the Orinoco, a mighty river,

coming from mighty mountains, compared with which Ytaioa is like
a stone on the Around on which we have sat down to rest. You

must know that guayana is only a portion, a half, of our country,
Venezuela. Look," I continued, putting my hand round my shoulder

to touch the middle of my back, "there is a grooverunning down
my spine dividing my body into equal parts. Thus does the great

Orinoco divide Venezuela, and on one side of it is all Guayana;
and on the other side the countries or provinces of Cumana,

Maturm, Barcelona, Bolivar, Guarico, Apure, and many others." I
then gave a rapid description of the northern half of the

country, with its vast llanos covered with herds in one part, its
plantations of coffee, rice, and sugar-cane in another, and its

chief towns; last of all Caracas, the gay and opulent little
Paris in America.

This seemed to weary her; but the moment I ceased speaking, and
before I could well moisten my dry lips, she demanded to know

what came after Caracas--after all Venezuela.
"The ocean--water, water, water," I replied.

"There are no people there--in the water; only fishes," she
remarked; then suddenly continued: "Why are you silent--is

Venezuela, then, all the world?"
The task I had set myself to perform seemed only at its

commencement yet. Thinking how to proceed with it, my eyes roved
over the level area we were standing on, and it struck me that

this little irregular plain, broad at one end and almost pointed
at the other, roughly resembled the South American continent in

its form.
"Look, Rima," I began, "here we are on this small pebble--Ytaioa;

and this line round it shuts us in--we cannot see beyond. Now
let us imagine that we can see beyond--that we can see the whole

flat mountaintop; and that, you know, is the whole world. Now
listen while I tell you of all the countries, and principal

mountains, and rivers, and cities of the world."
The plan I had now fixed on involved a great deal of walking

about and some hard work in moving and setting up stones and
tracing boundary and other lines; but it gave me pleasure, for

Rima was close by all the time, following me from place to place,
listening to all I said in silence but with keen interest. At

the broad end of the level summit I marked out Venezuela, showing
by means of a long line how the Orinoco divided it, and also

marking several of the greater streams flowing into it. I also
marked the sites of Caracas and other large towns with stones;

and rejoiced that we are not like the Europeans, great
city-builders, for the stones proved heavy to lift. Then

followed Colombia and Ecuador on the west; and, successively,
Bolivia, Peru, Chile, ending at last in the south with Patagonia,

a cold arid land, bleak and desolate. I marked the littoral
cities as we progressed on that side, where earth ends and the

Pacific Ocean begins, and infinitude.
Then, in a sudden burst of inspiration, I described the

Cordilleras to her--that world-long, stupendous chain; its sea of
Titicaca, and wintry, desolate Paramo, where lie the ruins of

Tiahuanaco, older than Thebes. I mentioned its principal
cities--those small inflamed or festering pimples that attract

much attention from appearing on such a body. Quito, called--not
in irony, but by its own people--the Splendid and the

Magnificent; so high above the earth as to appear but a little
way removed from heaven--"de Quito al cielo," as the saying is.

But of its sublime history, its kings and conquerors, Haymar
Capac the Mighty, and Huascar, and Atahualpa the Unhappy, not one

word. Many words--how inadequate!--of the summits, white with
everlasting snows, above it--above this navel of the world, above

the earth, the ocean, the darkening tempest, the condor's flight.
Flame-breathing Cotopaxi, whose wrathful mutterings are audible

two hundred leagues away, and Chimborazo, Antisana, Sarata,
Illimani, Aconcagua--names of mountains that affect us like the

names of gods, implacable Pachacamac and Viracocha, whose
everlasting granite thrones they are. At the last I showed her

Cuzco, the city of the sun, and the highest dwelling-place of men
on earth.

I was carried away by so sublime a theme; and remembering that I
had no criticalhearer, I gave free reins to fancy, forgetting

for the moment that some undiscovered thought or feeling had
prompted her questions. And while I spoke of the mountains, she

hung on my words, following me closely in my walk, her
countenance brilliant. her frame quivering with excitement.

There yet remained to be described all that unimaginable space
east of the Andes; the rivers--what rivers!--the green plains

that are like the sea--the illimitable waste of water where there
is no land--and the forest region. The very thought of the

Amazonian forest made my spirit droop. If I could have snatched
her up and placed her on the dome of Chimborazo she would have

looked on an area of ten thousand square miles of earth, so vast
is the horizon at that elevation. And possibly her imagination

would have been able to clothe it all with an unbroken forest.
Yet how small a portion this would be of the stupendous whole--of

a forest region equal in extent to the whole of Europe! All
loveliness, all grace, all majesty are there; but we cannot see,

cannot conceive--come away! From this vast stage, to be occupied
in the distant future by millions and myriads of beings, like us

of upright form, the nations that will be born when all the
existing dominant races on the globe and the civilizations they

represent have perished as utterly as those who sculptured the
stones of old Tiahuanaco--from this theatre of palms prepared for

a drama unlike any which the Immortals have yet witnessed--I
hurried away; and then slowly conducted her along the Atlantic