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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(* The Inhabitants Of Araya Sometimes Sell These Small Pearls
To The Retail Dealers Of Cumana.
The ordinary price is one piastre
per dozen.) The problem is so much the more difficult to solve, as
We know not whether earthquakes may have altered the nature of the
bottom of the sea, or whether the changes of the submarine currents
may have had an influence either on the temperature of the water,
or on the abundance of certain mollusca on which the Aronde feeds.
On the morning of the 20th our host's son, a young and very robust
Indian, conducted us by the way of Barigon and Caney to the village
of Maniquarez, which was four hours' walk. From the effect of the
reverberation of the sands, the thermometer kept up to 31.3
degrees. The cylindric cactus, which bordered the road, gave the
landscape an appearance of verdure, without affording either
coolness or shade. Before our guide had walked a league, he began
to sit down every moment, and at length he wished to repose under
the shade of a fine tamarind tree near Casas de la Vela, to await
the approach of night. This characteristic trait, which we observed
every time we travelled with Indians, has given rise to very
erroneous ideas of the physical constitutions of the different
races of men. The copper-coloured native, more accustomed to the
burning heat of the climate, than the European traveller, complains
more, because he is stimulated by no interest. Money is without
attraction for him; and if he permits himself to be tempted by gain
for a moment, he repents of his resolution as soon as he is on the
road. The same Indian, who would complain, when in herborizing we
loaded him with a box filled with plants, would row his canoe
fourteen or fifteen hours together, against the strongest current,
because he wished to return to his family. In order to form a true
judgment of the muscular strength of the people, we should observe
them in circumstances where their actions are determined by a
necessity and a will equally energetic.
We examined the ruins of Santiago,* the structure of which is
remarkable for its extreme solidity. (* On the map accompanying
Robertson's History of America, we find the name of this castle
confounded with that of Nueva Cordoba. This latter denomination was
formerly synonymous with Cumana. - Herrera, page 14.) The walls of
freestone, five feet thick, have been blown up by mines; but we
still found masses of seven or eight hundred feet square, which
have scarcely a crack in them. Our guide showed us a cistern
(aljibe) thirty feet deep, which, though much damaged, furnishes
water to the inhabitants of the peninsula of Araya. This cistern
was finished in 1681, by the governor Don Juan de Padilla
Guardiola, the same who built at Cumana the small fort of Santa
Maria. As the basin is covered with an arched vault, the water,
which is of excellent quality, keeps very cool:
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