Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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A
Shallow Which Stretches Along Its Foot Is Known To Navigators By
The Name Of The Points Of Tutumo And Of San Francisco.
The road by land from Higuerote to Caracas, runs through a wild and
humid tract of country, by the Montana of Capaya, north of
Caucagua, and the valley of Rio Guatira and Guarenas.
Some of our
fellow-travellers determined on taking this road, and M. Bonpland
also preferred it, notwithstanding the continual rains and the
overflowing of the rivers. It afforded him the opportunity of
making a rich collection of new plants.* (* Bauhinia ferruginea,
Brownea racemosa, B ed. Inga hymenaeifolia, I. curiepensis (which
Willdenouw has called by mistake I. caripensis), etc.) For my part,
I continued alone with the Guaiqueria pilot the voyage by sea; for
I thought it hazardous to lose sight of the instruments which we
were to make use of on the banks of the Orinoco.
We set sail at night-fall. The wind was unfavourable, and we
doubled Cape Codera with difficulty. The surges were short, and
often broke one upon another. The sea ran the higher, owing to the
wind being contrary to the current, till after midnight. The
general motion of the waters within the tropics towards the west is
felt strongly on the coast during two-thirds of the year. In the
months of September, October, and November, the current often flows
eastward for fifteen or twenty days in succession; and vessels on
their way from Guayra to Porto Cabello have sometimes been unable
to stem the current which runs from west to east, although they
have had the wind astern. The cause of these anomalies is not yet
discovered. The pilots think they are the effect of gales of wind
from the north-west in the gulf of Mexico.
On the 21st of November, at sunrise, we were to the west of Cape
Codera, opposite Curuao. The coast is rocky and very elevated, the
scenery at once wild and picturesque. We were sufficiently near
land to distinguish scattered huts surrounded by cocoa-trees, and
masses of vegetation, which stood out from the dark ground of the
rocks. The mountains are everywhere perpendicular, and three or
four thousand feet high; their sides cast broad and deep shadows
upon the humid land, which stretches out to the sea, glowing with
the freshest verdure. This shore produces most of those fruits of
the hot regions, which are seen in such great abundance in the
markets of the Caracas. The fields cultivated with sugar-cane and
maize, between Camburi and Niguatar, stretch through narrow
valleys, looking like crevices or clefts in the rocks: and
penetrated by the rays of the sun, then above the horizon, they
presented the most singular contrasts of light and shade.
The mountain of Niguatar and the Silla of Caracas are the loftiest
summits of this littoral chain. The first almost reaches the height
of Canigou; it seems as if the Pyrenees or the Alps, stripped of
their snows, had risen from the bosom of the ocean; so much more
stupendous do mountains appear when viewed for the first time from
the sea. Near Caravalleda, the cultivated lands enlarge; we find
hills with gentle declivities, and the vegetation rises to a great
height. The sugar-cane is here cultivated, and the monks of La
Merced have a plantation with two hundred slaves. This spot was
formerly extremely subject to fever; and it is said that the air
has acquired salubrity since trees have been planted round a small
lake, the emanations of which were dreaded, and which is now less
exposed to the ardour of the sun. To the west of Caravalleda, a
wall of bare rock again projects forward in the direction of the
sea, but it has little extent. After having passed it, we
immediately discovered the pleasantly situated village of Macuto;
the black rocks of La Guayra, studded with batteries rising in
tiers one over another, and in the misty distance, Cabo Blanco, a
long promontory with conical summits, and of dazzling whiteness.
Cocoa-trees border the shore, and give it, under that burning sky,
an appearance of fertility.
I landed in the port of La Guayra, and the same evening made
preparations for transporting my instruments to Caracas. Having
been recommended not to sleep in the town, where the yellow fever
had been raging only a few weeks previously, I fixed my lodging in
a house on a little hill, above the village of Maiquetia, a place
more exposed to fresh winds than La Guayra. I reached Caracas on
the 21st of November, four days sooner than M. Bonpland, who, with
the other travellers on the land journey, had suffered greatly from
the rain and the inundations of the torrents, between Capaya and
Curiepe.
Before proceeding further, I will here subjoin a description of La
Guayra, and the extraordinary road which leads from thence to the
town of Caracas, adding thereto all the observations made by M.
Bonpland and myself, in an excursion to Cabo Blanco about the end
of January 1800.
La Guayra is rather a roadstead than a port. The sea is constantly
agitated, and ships suffer at once by the violence of the wind, the
tideways, and the bad anchorage. The lading is taken in with
difficulty, and the swell prevents the embarkation of mules here,
as at New Barcelona and Porto Cabello. The free mulattoes and
negroes, who carry the cacao on board the ships, are a class of men
remarkable for muscular strength. They wade up to their waists
through the water; and it is remarkable that they are never
attacked by the sharks, so common in this harbour. This fact seems
connected with what I have often observed within the tropics, with
respect to other classes of animals which live in society, for
instance monkeys and crocodiles. In the Missions of the Orinoco,
and on the banks of the river Amazon, the Indians, who catch
monkeys to sell them, know very well that they can easily succeed
in taming those which inhabit certain islands; while monkeys of the
same species, caught on the neighbouring continent, die of terror
or rage when they find themselves in the power of man.
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