Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
- Page 731 of 779 - First - Home
The Church Of La Vega Rises
Very Picturesquely Above A Range Of Hills Covered With Thick
Vegetation.
Scattered houses surrounded with date-trees seem to
denote the comfort of their inhabitants.
A chain of low mountains
separates the little river Guayra from the valley of La Pascua* (so
celebrated in the history of the country) (* Valley of Cortes, or
Easter Valley, so called because Diego de Losada, after having
defeated the Teques Indians, and their cacique Guaycaypuro, in the
mountains of San Pedro, spent the Easter there in 1567, before
entering the valley of San Francisco. In the latter place he
founded the city of Caracas.), and from the ancient gold-mines of
Baruta and Oripoto. Ascending in the direction of Carapa, we enjoy
once more the sight of the Silla, which appears like an immense
dome with a cliff on the side next the sea. This rounded summit,
and the ridge of Galipano crenated like a wall, are the only
objects which in this basin of gneiss and mica-slate impress a
peculiar character on the landscape. The other mountains have a
uniform and monotonous aspect.
A little before reaching the village of Antimano we observed on the
right a very curious geological phenomenon. In hollowing the new
road out of the rock, two large veins of gneiss were discovered in
the mica-slate. They are nearly perpendicular, intersecting all the
mica-slate strata, and are from six to eight toises thick. These
veins contain not fragments, but balls or spheres of granular
diabasis,* formed of concentric layers.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 731 of 779
Words from 198629 to 198887
of 211363
