GUIANA, or GUYANA, a large .district of South America, in which the British, the Dutch, the French, the Portuguese, and the Spaniards, have considerable settlements. It is situated between those vast rivers, the Orinoco and the Amazons, and by means of the Negro and the Cassiquiari, which unite their streams, forms an extensive island, separated during the rainy season by broad belts of water from the rest of the continent. The settle ments on the coast extend but a short distance in land. Those belonging to Great Britain, viz. BER• stem and DEMERARA, have been already described in this Svpkment. The province of SURINAM is described in the Encyclopedia, and to that account we have now only to add, that, by the peace recent ly concluded, it has returned to the dominion of its ancient masters, the Dutch, and is in a state of much higher cultivation than when it surrendered to the British arms. The number of its inhabitants have greatly increased, the cultivated lands have extended farther towards the interior, the clearing the forests has rendered the colony more healthy, and the means of defence against an enemy have been considerably strengthened.
The French settlement of Cayenne extends along the coast from the river Maroni, which separates it from Surinam, to the river Oyapock, which now di vides it from Portuguese Guiana. By the treaty of Amiens the French boundary had been extended to the river Arowari ; but when the government of Portugal was established in Brazil, a small force de tached from thence seized the province, and though, by the late treaties, it is restored to France, the boundary has been considerably contracted towards the south. The frontier of Cayenne towards the sea extends about 130 miles. The few settlements in the province are at the mouths of the rivers which water it, and produce its fertility. These rivers, like those of the English and Dutch settlements, have but short courses, their sources being in that range of mountains which runs parallel to the coast, about 150 miles from it, which is denominated the country of the Carib Indians, and which has not been penetrated by any European. The two rivers which now bound Cayenne have their sources in the cordilleras farther removed from the coast than the country of the Caribs ; they have, therefore, much longer courses, and discharge into the ocean much more copious waters than are contributed by those rivers which run through the French settlements. The most northern river of Cayenne is the Makouri, six leagues south of it is the Malmanouri, and far ther south, at nearly the same distance, is the Syne mari, at the mouth of which was established the hospital for the colony, being deemed the least un healthy part of the province. The other rivers are
the Mann, the Oyac, and the Approuague.
The island of Cayenne, on which the capital is built, extends about eleven miles from east to west, and sixteen from north to south; it is separated from the main by a small river, which is fordable at low. water, but at high-tide is navigable by boats. The city is built on the north-west extremity of the island, at the mouth of a river of the same name. It is fortified strongly, and a hill within the inclosure commands the whole town and the anchorage of the shipping ; it, is in latitude 4° 56', and west longitude 52° 15' from London. Both divisions of the town are ill built and badly paved ; the streets in the new part are wider, and the houses larger than in the old one, but neither are equal to the generali. ty of even tropical towns in beauty and cleanliness. With the 'exception of the officers of government, very few of the inhabitants are of the unmixed white race, but are either mulattos, quaderoons, sambas, or negro slaves. Debauchery, indolence, and knay.
try, are the characteristics of the greater part of the people of this city.
This colony was first settled in the year 1550 by the celebrated Admiral de Coligny, who, during the civil wars of France, wished to make it an asylum, where the Protestants, if unsuccessful, might retire to follow, in security, their worship and opinions. The course of events in Europe, after the return of Coligny, was such as to prevent the colony from being long an object of attention, and the few set tlers were neglected by the government of France for nearly two centuries. Neither the settlers nor the negro slaves increased much, and the few de scendants of the original Europeans were so incor porated, by successive intermixtures, with the co loured inhabitants, that the difference of their race was with difficulty to be discovered by their com plexions. The colony of Canada engrossed so large a portion of the regard of the French court, that the establishment at Cayenne was only kept from sink ing by the access ion of a few isolated settlers, who occasionally fixed themselves in it, as a desperate and last resource. When, by the loss of Canada, the other colonial settlements became of more value, an effort was made, upon a grand scale, to increase the population, and promote the cultivation of Guiana.