Rivers Winey, Barima and Oronoco, thereby cutting off, although for a time only, that intercourse so essential to the general welfare of the Pomeroon District."

Mr. im Thurn, the able and efficient British Government Agent in charge of the existing Northwestern District, who has had twenty years' experience in the colony, says (V. C., p. 27) of what he calls "a narrow itabbo or artificial water-path, which connects the Moruka with the Waini River":

"This connecting passage is in all about 30 miles in length; but only about the first 10 miles of this is actually semi-artificial itabbo, made by the constant passage of the canoes of the Redman through the swampy savannah.

"We found the itabbo section of this passage very difficult to get through. Generally, it was hardly wider than the boat, and its many abrupt windings added to our difficulties. We had either to force the boat under the low-lying branches or make a passage by cutting them away. On either side of the channel the ground is so swampy as hardly anywhere to allow foothold of even a few inches in extent.

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"This itabbo is quite dry in the longer dry seasons, and is then, of course, impassable; for walking along its banks is out of question-a circumstance which has a good deal to do with the fact that the parts beyond had up till then been almost completely shut off from the rest of the colony."

The principles which have been already stated in discussing the legal effect of geographical features in the interior district apply with equal force to the coast. As has been already stated, the question is a question of natural outlets. Is the natural outlet of the Amakura and the Barima, and even of the Waini, which is to connect those rivers with the nearest trade centres and with the rest of the world, through the broad and deep channels at their mouths, into the Orinoco, or is it through an artificial water-path thirty miles long, "hardly wider than the boat," which during a great part of the time is wholly impassable? These last are the features of the only outlet from the coast territory to the Essequibo, according to the highest British authority, the Government Agent

for the district. To which river system are these great water courses and the territory through which they flow naturally appurtenant? This admits of but one answer.

Close the itabo permanently and it will have no appreciable effect upon this district. Is it to be supposed that anybody goes now by that route in preference to going outside by steamer? This immense territory is in no way dependent upon the passage through the savanna.

We cannot close this discussion without calling attention to the grossly misleading character of Map 3 of the British Atlas, which purports to show the water-basins. The author of the British Case has chosen to unite the basin of the Cuyuni and Massaruni with that of the Essequibo. Of this we do not complain, because it is, perhaps, well to show in this graphic way how the application of the watershed theory makes in the British view of this case the possession of the island of Kykoveral extend constructively to the banks of the Orinoco. It also shows to what impossible results the watershed theory would lead if it were applied, as the law forbids it to be applied, to lateral frontiers. The point with which we are particularly concerned, however, especially in view of the definition given to the so-called " Essequibo basin," is that given to the Orinoco basin. While every tributary of a tributary of the Essequibo is carefully included in the "basin" of that river, one of the most important tributaries of the Orinoco is excluded from the Orinoco basin, and the Barima is joined with the Waini as if it were a tributary of the latter. The Barima certainly is a tributary of the Orinoco. If the Waini is a tributary of the Barima, it is also a tributary of the Orinoco. If they can be united by a common outlet, they form an integral part of the basin of the Orinoco.

A discussion of the principles of law bearing upon natural features is unnecessary in this case, because they have no application where the question, as here, is of establishing title by adverse

holding. They have only been mentioned in order to emphasize the fact that the physical features of the territory in dispute make it a natural appurtenance of the Orinoco rather than of the Essequibo, and because at various times in the history of the controversy, chiefly through the West India Company's ignorance of this fact, some claim inconsistent with it has been made. In the case of an adverse holder, however, all these grounds of constructive possession are denied. He takes only that which he actually holds; and whether the natural outlet is through him or through the holder of the prior title, it can avail him naught.

CHAPTER VI.

SPANISH TITLE-DISCOVERY.

We now address ourselves to a discussion of the territorial titles of Spain and Venezuela, on the one side, and of the Netherlands and of Great Britain, on the other, in Guiana.

Venezuela asserts a title to the territory in dispute, based upon the discovery of Guiana by Spain. Guiana had become a known and defined geographical district, by the name of the "Province of Guiana," before the earliest Dutch voyager touched its shores. Antonio de Berrio, writing in 1593, speaks repeatedly of "Guiana," and gives its bounds thus:

"These great provinces lie between two very great rivers, namely, the Amazon and the Orinoco "* (B. C., I., p. 5).

In the anonymous petition to the States General, assigned by the British Case to the year 1603, we have this description of the "Province of Guiana":

"The Province of Guiana, situated in America, lies upon 4, 6, and more degrees north of the equator, extending from the great River Amazon to Punt della Rae or Trinidad" (B. C., I., p. 24).

From this we learn that, before the Dutch had entertained a thought of going there for settlement, the bounds of Guiana were well known to them, and that it had come to be called a "Province," a name that does not appropriately describe an unappropriated country.

But we do not need to follow the evidence found in the cases of the respective governments, in order to establish our point that Guiana, at the time of its discovery and settlement by Spain, was a distinct geographical unit, having natural boundaries as

* The region was described by Domingo de Vera as "the noble prouinces of Guiana and Dorado" (V. C., vol. i., p. 39).

distinct as those of an island-for all this is most forcibly stated to be true in the British Case. It is there said:

“Guiana, as understood by historians and geographers, comprises the territory bounded by the Orinoco, the Cassiquiare, the Rio Negro, the Amazon, and the Atlantic Ocean, whence it was often spoken of as the Island of Guiana" (B. C., p. 6).

Major John Scott, who is given credit by the presentation in the British Case (I., p. 167) of a report ascribed to him, upon Guiana, and attributed to the year 1669, speaks of Guiana as a "province" bounded on the southeast by the Amazon and on the northwest by the Orinoco, fronting 230 leagues on the Atlantic Ocean, and says these rivers meet in the interior. He therefore calls it an island." The area embraced within these bounds is

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about 690,000 square miles.

And yet in the British Counter-Case (p. 137, par. 2) we have this remarkable statement:

"There was no province of Guiana, and no defined tract of territory to which Spain became entitled by virtue of her settlement on the Orinoco."

It is admitted by Great Britain that this distinct, well defined geographical unit, called Guiana, was discovered by Spain. We quote:

"It is admitted that Spain was the first nation to discover Guiana" (B. C.-C., p. 130).

These admissions might be fairly taken to relieve the counsel of Venezuela from the duty of referring to any of the evidence bearing upon the subject of the discovery of Guiana by Spain. But we prefer to call attention briefly to a few of the Spanish voyages to the coasts and rivers of Guiana, and of Spanish expeditions into the interior, especially as it is claimed by Great Britain that Spain's explorations were very limited.

As early as 1502 Alonso de Ojeda, sailing from Cadiz, in command of an expedition, visited the Gulf of Paria, at the mouth of the Orinoco (Winsor. Narrative and Critical History, vol. ii, p 189).