“Once that dark and loathly pitch-lake
Was a garden, bright and fair,
And the Chaymas, from the mainland,
Built their palm ajoupas there.
There they throve, and there they fattened.
Hale and happy, safe and strong,
Passed the livelong days in feasting,
Passed the nights in dance and song.
Till they cruel grew, and wanton,
Till they killed the colibris,
Then outspoke the Great good Spirit,
Who can see through all the trees.”
The spirit proceeded to remind the Chaymas of all the good things he had provided for them; how he had allowed them unlimited use of all things which could be of any possible good to them; how he had even been patient with their thanklessness. Only the colibris or humming-birds, useless to the Chaymas, he had reserved for himself, that he might have pleasure in their beauty and happiness. The story continues:
“But the Chaymas’ ears were deafened;
Blind their eyes, and could not see,
How a blissful Indian’s spirit
Lived in every colibri.
Lived, forgetting pain and sorrow,
Ever fair and ever new,
Whirring round the dear old woodland,
Feeding on the honeydew.
Then one evening roared the earthquake,
Monkeys howled, and parrots screamed,
And the Guaraons, at morning
Gathered here, as men who dreamed.
Sunk were gardens, sunk ajoupas,
Hut and hammock, man and hound,
And above the Chayma village,
Boiled with pitch the cursed ground.”
The salient points of the evidence being presented, the reader may draw his own conclusions. Perhaps the cities were fired in the manner suggested—perhaps lightning ignited the bitumen. But it is generally supposed that their site lies beneath the sea.