flows.  It is claimed that it is formed by four streams descending from these mountains, and the Spaniards have named it San Juan.  Where it falls into the gulf, it has seven mouths, like the Nile.  In this same Uraba region the continent diminishes in size in an astonishing manner, and it is said that in places its width is not more than fifteen leagues.  The country is impassable because of its swamps and quagmires which the Spaniards call tremelaes or trampales, or by other names cenegales, sumineros, and zahoudaderos.[15]

[Note 14:  The Dobaiba may be either the Magdalena or the Atrato.]

[Note 15:  All words meaning practically the same thing, viz., bog, quagmire, swamp, quicksand, etc., some of them evidently obsolete, as they are not found in modern Spanish dictionaries.]

Before going farther it may not be useless to explain the derivation of the name of these mountains.  According to native tradition there formerly lived a woman of great intelligence and extraordinary prudence, called Dobaiba.  Even during her lifetime she was highly respected, and after her death the natives of the country venerated her; and it is her name the country bears.  She it is who sends thunder and lightning, who destroys the crops when she is vexed, for they childishly believe, that Dobaiba becomes angry when they fail to offer sacrifices in her honour.  There are deceivers who, under the pretence of religion, inculate this belief among the natives, hoping thereby to increase the number of gifts offered by the latter to the goddess, and thus augment their own profits.  This is enough on this subject.

It is related that in the swamps of this narrow part of the continent numerous crocodiles, dragons, bats, and gnats exist, all of the most formidable description.  In seeking to reach the southern sea, it is necessary to go through the mountains, and to avoid the neighbourhood of these swamps.  Some people claim that a single valley separates in two ranges the mountains facing the southern sea, and that in this valley rises the river which the Spaniards have named Rio de los Perdidos, in memory of the catastrophe of Nicuesa and his companions.  It is not far distant from Cerabaro; but as its waters are fresh, I believe the people who sustain this theory are telling fables.

Let us close this chapter with one last topic.  To the right and left of Darien flow about a score of gold-producing rivers.  We here repeat what has been told to us, and about which everybody agrees.  When asked why they did not bring more considerable quantities of gold from that country, the Spaniards answer that miners are required, and that the explorers of the new countries are not men inured to fatigue.  This explains why much less gold is obtained than the wealth of the soil affords.  It would even seem that precious stones are found there.  Without repeating what I have said concerning Cariai and the