Gonzalo Pizarro, on his journey down the Napo in 1539, heard wonderful stories of a golden city far away on the banks of the Orinoco, surrounded by mountains of gold. Rumors of this golden city were carried by English navigators to Great Britain, with legends of a prince of Guiana, whose body, first smeared with turpentine, was then powdered with gold dust, so that he strode among his people a majestic golden statue. Adventurers started in search of this El Dorado, some from Peru, others from Quito and from Trinidad; but the golden city was never found. They, however, brought back reports of chiefs whose bodies sparkled with gold dust as they danced, who had golden eagles dangling from their breasts and great pearls from their ears; they told of mines of diamonds and gold, and of the natives who longed to exchange their jewels for jews-harps.
Sir Walter Raleigh determined to find this country and bring to his queen its fabulous riches, for he believed that the silver and gold mines of Mexico and Peru had made Spain the first state in Christendom—"that purchaseth intelligence and creepeth into counsels and endangereth and disturbeth all the nations of Europe."
In 1595, Sir Walter sailed from England and arrived at the Isle of Trinidad, where he overthrew the Spaniards, then sailed up the Orinoco, or one of its branches, four hundred miles, until hunger and sickness compelled him to return. Although he did not reach the golden city, he could see the mountains far in the distance which he believed surrounded it, and he found the shining sand on the banks of the Orinoco. In Guiana he raised the flag of England and compelled the Indians to swear fealty to his queen.
Twenty years later, a prisoner in the Tower, he was released in order to make a second voyage in search of this El Dorado for King James. He sailed in 1617, accompanied by his eldest son; but disaster and sickness met him at every step. He reached the Orinoco again, too feeble to land. So his son and Captain Keymis went instead. Keymis returned after a month of exploration, bringing Raleigh the news of the death of his son in an attack on a Spanish town. He brought reports of the golden city, of the mines of gold, diamonds and emeralds, but neither gold, diamonds nor emeralds to confirm the truth of these reports. Raleigh said, "I am undone;" Keymis replied, "I know then, Sir, what course to take." He went to his cabin and killed himself.
Raleigh returned to England, a broken down old man. The Spaniards demanded his life of James as they had demanded it of Elizabeth after his first expedition, on the ground that in time of peace Raleigh had attacked the Spanish forces and invaded their country. Elizabeth had refused, but James yielded. Raleigh was executed, but Guiana became an English colony.
The gold and silver mines of Peru have failed; little gold has been found in Guiana, but its rich and fertile soil, watered by tropical rains, has been a source of greater wealth than the gold mines of Peru.
POPULATION OF SOUTH AMERICA.
As the countries of South America were all settled at about the same time and by the same race and have passed through a like history, they can be considered as a whole.
The United States and Canada, with a rough, uncongenial climate and sterile soil, were settled by the Anglo-Saxons, the remainder of the western continent by the Latin race and, excepting Brazil and Guiana, by Spaniards. In North America the Anglo-Saxon race has dominated, carrying civilization from the Atlantic to the Pacific, expelling and exterminating the aborigines. There has been no mingling of the Anglo-Saxon and Indian races, no backward step, but ever civil, religious and intellectual progress. The Latin race conquered Central America and South America, a perfect Eden of natural loveliness, one hundred years prior to the settlement of the Anglo-Saxon; yet to-day they constitute but a thin layer over a scarcely populated country. Their leaders were men of unbounded ambition, rapacious, of great endurance, but cruel and unscrupulous. They sought adventure, expecting it would bring them gold and silver. For that end they plundered, despoiled and enslaved the Indians. Gold and silver flowed into their hands; luxury, effeminacy, and weakness followed.
The Spaniards in America have scarcely retained the civilization they brought from the old world. They have intermarried with the Indians, and this mixed race is said to inherit the vices of each of their ancestors without the virtues of either.