Note 2 — Chapter III · THE GREAT RIVER
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A flock of these tall, white birds, seen feeding in an everglade in Cuba was, during the second voyage of Columbus, taken for a party of men clad in white tunics, and led the Admiral to believe that they were inhabitants of Mangon, a province just south of Cathay. Indeed, so striking is their resemblance to men posted as sentinels that, according to Humboldt, “the inhabitants of Angostura, soon after the foundation of their city, were one day alarmed by the sudden appearance of soldados and garzas, on a mountain towards the south. They believed they were menaced with an attack of Indios monteros, wild Indians, called mountaineers; and the people were not perfectly tranquilized till they saw the birds soaring in the air and continuing their migration towards the mouths of the Orinoco.”2