II. GEOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE DISPUTED Location and Extent of Disputed The disputed territory lies on the north-eastern border of South America, between the Essequibo and Territory. Orinoco rivers. It extends from the coast southward as far as the boundary with Brazil. Venezuela claims the entire region as far east as the western bank of the Essequibo: Her Majesty's Government has, at various times, made mention of an "extreme British claim" from the Essequibo west as far as the main mouth of the Orinoco, on the coast, and, in the interior, as far as the divide which separates the drainage basin of the Cuyuni from the drainage basin of the Orinoco. * Division of Territory into four The relations of the various parts of this territory to the question in controversy will be best appreciated if tracts. the entire region be considered as divisible into four great tracts: First. That which drains directly into the Orinoco below the junction of that river with the Caroni. Second. That which, lying between the Essequibo on the east, the Moruca on the northwest, and the Imataca mountains on the southwest, drains directly into the Atlantic Ocean. Third. That which, constitutes the great interior Cuyuni-Mazaruni basin. Fourth. That which, stretching from the junction of the Cuyuni, Mazaruni and Essequibo towards the south, constitutes the upper drainage basin of the Essequibo. These four tracts will be considered in the order named. * In British Blue Book, Venezuela, No. 1 (1896), map 9, however, it is stated that this "extreme British claim * * * is not pressed." Orinoco Delta Region. Points of special importance. Geographic Unity of Orinoco Delta Region. 1. ORINOCO DELTA REGION. The first of these tracts, which for convenience may be called the Orinoco Delta Region, includes a portion of the lower drainage basin of the Orinoco, and a great part of its delta. It is bounded on the north and west by the Orinoco itself; on the south by a range of hills or mountains, to different parts of which have been applied the designations "Piacoa mountains" and "Imataca mountains "; on the east it is separated from the second of the four tracts above mentioned; first, by a wet savanna difficult to traverse; and, further inland, by a tract of white sand, miles in length, white almost as the driven snow, hot and dazzling to the eyes, difficult and even painful to travel over. The points to be especially noted in connection with this tract are: 1st, its essential unity or indivisibility, geographically speaking; and 2d, the importance of Barima as a point from which the entire Orinoco system may be controlled. 1ST. GEOGRAPHIC UNITY OF THE ORINOCO DELTA REGION. A glance at the nature and extent of the Orinoco river and of its delta will make this apparent. The Orinoco, except for the Amazon the greatest river of South America, and one of the world's great rivers, after flowing for miles 1,500 through a region of large precipitation, discharges its waters through a mighty, forest-clad delta. The area of this delta is about 12,000 square miles; and its coast line is fully 250 miles long. Through this delta the Orinoco discharges its waters by an uncounted number of channels, estimated at 150; of which three or four may be navigated by craft of considerable size. The main or "Ship's Mouth," that which alone is available for large steamers, and that which to day serves as the main channel of commerce, is the one which empties into the Atlantic Ocean between Crab island and Barima point. Into the Orinoco, at and above Barima point, flow various streams: the Barima, Amacura, Arature, Aguire and Imataca. The Barima, between Mora passage and Barima point, can hardly be called an independent stream; it is rather one of those many channels through which the Orinoco empties its waters into the ocean. At certain states of the tide the waters of the Barima flow westward and are discharged into the Orinoco; at other states the current is in the opposite direction, the water from the Orinoco flowing eastward through this same Barima channel, and discharging through the Mora passage into the sea. This set of conditions, which converts the lower Barima and the Mora passage into a veritable Orinoco mouth, gives rise to unusual conditions in the Mora passage itself; conditions which serve to emphasize the intimate connection between the Mora passage and the main mouth of the Orinoco. H. I. Perkins, F. R. G. S., government surveyor, in an article published in Timehri,* in June, 1889, thus describes these conditions: "A peculiar feature of this (Mora) passage is the remarkable swiftness of its current, both at ebb and flow, and the presence of large trees which have been washed down and anchored by their roots, and have become fixed in the centre of the channel, where they sway, bend, creak and groan, as the water swirls past them at the rate of five or six miles an hour. As the distance from the sea of the Barima and Waini ends of the passage, is respectively fifty-one and eight miles, there is considerable difficulty in comprehending the state of the water in the passage, for sometimes it is falling at one end and rising at the other, and vice versa, or *Timehri is the journal of the Royal Agricultural and Commercial Society of British Guiana, published at Demerara. Orinoco River. Barima River and Mora passage. Description of Mora passage by Perkins. rising or falling at both ends, according to the state of the tide in the sea at the time."* Also intimately connected with the Lower Orinoco, as will appear from the passage just quoted, is the Waini, a river which empties into the ocean, in part through its own mouth, but in part also, through this same Mora passage and the Barima river. The Waini, with the region through which it flows, constitutes a part of the great Orinoco delta. The intimate connection, with each other and with the Orinoco, of these various streams, the Waini, the Barima, the Amacura, the Arature, and the rest, is evidenced by the physical features of the region, proved by the history of settlement and trade (to be examined later), and explicitly recognized by British explorers and British writers. Mr. Everard F. im Thurn, in a paper read before the Royal Geographical Society, and published in its Proceedings for 1892, thus describes the coast region: "Its coast region, which consists mainly of a series of river deltas, is almost everywhere very low,—indeed, almost invariably below the level of the sea. It is everywhere, except where the hand of mau has worked a change, covered by a dense growth of trees, of which so large a proportion are the semi-aquatic, stiltraised mangroves (Rhizophora mangle), or the somewhat similar courida (Avicennia nitida), that it requires a careful eye to distinguish the presence of any other species amid the scenery to which these two trees give a very distinctive character. From this low-lying mangrove belt, which may be said to be yet only half land, half sea, there is a gradual, at first scarcely perceptible, rise; but, further inland, the alluvial tract ending at varying distance from the sea, the land rises far more rapidly, in a series of terraces, till it culminates in the comparatively high, dry table-land *Timehri. 12°, Demerara, 1889, June, vol. 3, p. 55. For further information regarding the Mora passage, see U. S. Commission, Report, iii., pp. 249–253. which, in Guiana, is called savannah, and which forms so much of the interior of the continent of South America.”* Further on he adds: "The network of rivers is in itself a natural wonder; the Waini, with its sister, or tributary, the Barama, and the Barima, and the Amakuru, all of which, though they have long appeared on our maps, have virtually remained unknown until the last few years, and have remained completely outside the limits of civilization and settlement. The Waini system and the Barima are wide and deep rivers, affording water-passage for vessels up to 15 or 16 feet draught, for 80 or more miles inland from the sea; the Morawhanna, navigable for equally large vessels, forms a link between these two main rivers. Thus we have one splendid waterway, and many small water-ways affording passage to small boats between all the rivers of the district, and between these and the Orinoco on the one hand, and the old civilised portion of the colony on the other." Schomburgk, in a letter to Governor Light, dated June 22, 1841, says: "We reached in the afternoon, at 3 o'clock, the Coyuni [this is elsewhere more correctly called by him Brazo, i. e., Coyoni Pass, a stream connecting the Amacura with the Arature, and not to be confounded with the great Cuyuni river in the interior] which, like the Mora from the Waini to the Barima, and vice versa, forms an uninterrupted passage in canoes from the Amacura to the Araturi. The Coyuni connects the Amacura with the Waicaicaru or Bassama, which falls into the Araturi. This river flows opposite the island Imataca into the Orinoco, and is another instance of a remarkable connection between the tidal rivers of this coast."1 2D.--THE POLITICAL, MILITARY AND COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCE OF BARIMA POINT. The importance of Barima point, and of the land and rivers immediately surrounding it, is due to its * Royal Geog. Soc. Proceedings, London, 1892, October, vol. XIV, 666-667. Same, p. 668. Appendix to Case, iii, 89. pp. |