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This alcalde of the reduced Macos quitted the village of Atures for a few months every year, to live in the plantations which he possessed in the midst of the forests near the hamlet of the independent Macos. In consequence of this peaceful intercourse, many of the Indios monteros came and established themselves some time ago in the mission.
Notwithstanding the small extent of the mission, three Indian languages are spoken at Esmeralda; the Idapimanare, the Catarapenno, and the Maquiritan. The latter live, jointly with a tribe of the Macos, in the savannahs that are by the Padamo. These are the five or six languages most generally spoken.
We learned that his grief was caused by the loss of a young girl to whom he was engaged, and that he had lost her in consequence of false intelligence which had been spread respecting the direction of our journey. Zerepe, who was a native of Maypures, had been brought up in the woods by his parents, who were of the tribe of the Macos.
I was again struck, as I had been among the Salives and the Macos, with the little uniformity of features to be found among the Indians of the Orinoco. Their look is sad and gloomy; but neither stern nor ferocious. Without having any notion of the practices of the Christian religion, they behaved with the utmost decency at church.
Besides the Piaroas of Cataniapo, who pierce their ears, and wear as ear-ornaments the teeth of caymans and peccaries, three other tribes of Macos are known: one, on the Ventuari, above the Rio Mariata; the second, on the Padamo, north of the mountains of Maraguaca; and the third, near the Guaharibos, towards the sources of the Orinoco, above the Rio Gehette.
We learned on the spot, that the Atures, as well as the Quaquas, and the Macos or Piaroas, belong to the great stock of the Salive nations; while the Maypures, the Abanis, the Parenis, and the Guaypunaves, are of the same race as the Cabres or Caveres, celebrated for their long wars with the Caribs.
On going up by the mouth of the Ventuari, which forms a delta covered with palm-trees, you find in the east, after three days' journey, the Cumaruita and the Paru, two streams that rise at the foot of the lofty mountains of Cuneva. Higher up, on the west, lie the Mariata and the Manipiare, inhabited by the Macos and Curacicanas.
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