84
TRINIDAD.
Raleigh committed certain gentlemanly piracies, when he was on his first voyage to discover El Dorado. The Spanish governor, it appears, did not know his right hand from his left, a thing evidently as heinous as true, and which no doubt deserved to be severely punished by every Englishman. The commanding officer here, Major Taylor, had the finest collection of humming birds I ever saw. He had shot and stuffed them all himself with the assistance of a small negro gamekeeper. Arima is eight or nine miles farther on, and is the principal mission of the Indians. They have one large square and a street or two, and the buildings are more substantial than at Savana Grande. The community is opulent in plantations of cacao, and is obliged to keep up a Casa Real, a prison, a large church, two schools, and maintain their padre. Indians and free negros are admitted into these schools, but the master of the boys told me there were no slaves. They were all taught to read and write, in the last of which the Indians seemed to excel. Some of their copies were beautiful specimens of penmanship. The room was divided into Troja, Cartago, and Roma, and the chief book of instruction was the old Caton Cristiano, which with all its Romish garblings and foppery is a very good text book for the young savages. The horrible absurdity of the paintings in the church exceeded anything in my experience of Romish licence. I am sure the bishop of Gerren