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HIDDEN TREASURE 511
of a quarrel which broke out among the miners
themselves and resulted in the death of one of
them. In the other, the river (the Lliquino) rose
suddenly on them by night and carried off their
canoes (in which a quantity of roughly-washed gold
was heaped up), besides the Long Tom and all their
other implements.
I close this memoir by an explanation of the
Ouichua terms which occur most frequently on the
map.
Spanish authors use the vowels it and o almost indiscriminately
in writing Quichua names, although the latter sound does not
exist in that language ; and in some words which have become
grafted on the Spanish, as spoken in Peru and Ecuador, the o has
but in the actual
supplanted the it not only in the orthography
pronunciation, as, for instance, in Pongo and Cocha, although the
Indians still say "Chimbu-rasu," and not "Chimborazo "
"Cutupacsi
" or "Cutu-pagsi," and not "Cotopaxi." The sound of the
English w is indicated in Spanish by gu or //// that of the French
;
j does not exist in Spanish, and is represented by //, whose
sound is somewhat similar; thus "Lligua" is pronounced "Jiwa."
"
is Llanganati" now pronounced with the Spanish sound of the
//, but whether this be the original mode is doubtful. An unaccented
terminal e (as in Spanish is "verde") exceedingly rare in
Indian languages, and has mostly been incorrectly used for a
short /; thus, if we wish to represent the exact pronunciation, we
should write "Casiquiari," "Ucayali," and " Llanganati "
not
Casiquiare, Ucayale, Llanganate.
"Llanganati" may come from "llanga," to touch, because the
group of mountains called by that name touches on the sources of
the rivers all round ; thus, on (In/man's map, we find "Llanganatis
del Rio Verde "" Llanganatis del Topo "
"Llanganatis del
Curaray," for those suctions of the group which respectively touch
on the Rio Verde, the Topo, and the Curaray. The following are
examples of the mode of using the verb "
"llanga." Ama llangaiclm
!" -"'Touch it not!" "
"Imap;ig llanca"ngui ? -"Why do
you touch it"; or " Pitag llancaynirca ?
"
-"Who told you to
touch it?" And the answer might be " Llancanatag chari c;irca
I touched it/'
]lancarc;im." "[Thinking] it might be touched,
It is to be noted that the frequent use of the letter^, in place
of c,
is a provincialism of the Ouitonian Andes, where (for
instance) they mostly say "Inga" instead of "Inc;i." But in