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 Prices To The Other Tribes Are, At
Araya Ten, At Cumana Twelve Reals.) This Augmentation Of Price Is
Slightly Compensated By Greater Purity Of The Salt, And By The
Facility With Which The Fishermen And Farmers Can Procure It In
Abundance During The Whole Year.
The salt-works of Araya yielded to
the treasury, in 1799, a clear income of eight thousand piastres.
Considered as a branch of industry the salt produced here is not of
any great importance, but the nature of the soil which contains the
salt-marshes is well worthy of attention. In order to obtain a
clear idea of the geological connection existing between this
muriatiferous soil and the rocks of more ancient formation, we
shall take a general view of the neighbouring mountains of Cumana,
and those of the peninsula of Araya, and the island of Margareta.
Three great parallel chains extend from east to west. The two most
northerly chains are primitive, and contain the mica-slates of
Macanao, and the San Juan Valley, of Maniquarez, and of
Chuparipari. These we shall distinguish by the names of Cordillera
of the island of Margareta, and Cordillera of Araya. The third
chain, the most southerly of the whole, the Cordillera of the
Brigantine and of the Cocollar, contains rocks only of secondary
formation; and, what is remarkable enough, though analogous to the
geological constitution of the Alps westward of St. Gothard, the
primitive chain is much less elevated than that which was composed
of secondary rocks.* (* In New Andalusia, the Cordillera of the
Cocollar nowhere contains primitive rocks. If these rocks form the
nucleus of this chain, and rise above the level of the neighbouring
plains, which is scarcely probable, we must suppose that they are
all covered with limestone and sandstone. In the Swiss Alps, on the
contrary, the chain which is designated under the too vague
denomination of lateral and calcareous, contains primitive rocks,
which, according to the observations of Escher and Leopold von
Buch, are often visible to the height of eight hundred or a
thousand toises.) The sea has separated the two northern
Cordilleras, those of the island of Margareta and the peninsula of
Araya; and the small islands of Coche and of Cubagua are remnants
of the land that was submerged. Farther to the south, the vast gulf
Cariaco stretches away, like a longitudinal valley formed by the
irruption of the sea, between the two small chains of Araya and the
Cocollar, between the mica-slate and the Alpine limestone. We shall
soon see that the direction of the strata, very regular in the
first of these rocks, is not quite parallel with the general
direction of the gulf. In the high Alps of Europe, the great
longitudinal valley of the Rhone also sometimes cuts at an oblique
angle the calcareous banks in which it has been excavated.
The two parallel chains of Araya and the Cocollar were connected,
to the east of the town of Cariaco, between the lakes of Campoma
and Putaquao, by a kind of transverse dyke, which bears the name of
Cerro de Meapire, and which in distant times, by resisting the
impulse of the waves, has hindered the waters of the gulf of
Cariaco from uniting with those of the gulf of Paria. Thus, in
Switzerland, the central chain, that which passes by the Col de
Ferrex, the Simplon, St. Gothard, and the Splugen, is connected on
the north and the south with two lateral chains, by the mountains
of Furca and Maloya. It is interesting to recall to mind those
striking analogies exhibited in both continents by the external
structure of the globe.
The primitive chain of Araya ends abruptly in the meridian of the
village of Maniquarez; and the western slope of the peninsula, as
well as the plains in the midst of which stands the castle of San
Antonio, is covered with very recent formations of sandstone and
clay mixed with gypsum. Near Maniquarez, breccia or sandstone with
calcareous cement, which might easily be confounded with real
limestone, lies immediately over the mica-slate; while on the
opposite side, near Punta Delgada, this sandstone covers a compact
bluish grey limestone, almost destitute of petrifactions, and
traversed by small veins of calcareous spar. This last rock is
analogous to the limestone of the high Alps.* (* Alpenkalkstein.)
The very recent sandstone formation of the peninsula of Araya
contains: - first, near Punta Arenas, a stratified sandstone,
composed of very fine grains, united by a calcareous cement in
small quantity; - secondly, at the Cerro de la Vela, a schistose
sandstone,* (* Sandsteinschiefer.) without mica, and passing into
slate-clay,* (* Thonschiefer.) which accompanies coal; - thirdly, on
the western side, between Punta Gorda and the ruins of the castle
of Santiago, breccia composed of petrified sea-shells united by a
calcareous cement, in which are mingled grains of quartz;
- fourthly, near the point of Barigon, whence the stone employed
for building at Cumana is obtained, banks of yellowish white shelly
limestone, in which are found some scattered grains of quartz;
- fifthly, at Penas Negras, at the top of the Cerro de la Vela, a
bluish grey compact limestone, very tender, almost without
petrifactions, and covering the schistose sandstone. However
extraordinary this mixture of sandstone and compact limestone* (*
Dichter kalkstein.) may appear, we cannot doubt that these strata
belong to one and the same formation. The very recent secondary
rocks everywhere present analogous phenomena; the molasse of the
Pays de Vaud contains a fetid shelly limestone, and the cerite
limestone of the banks of the Seine is sometimes mixed with
sandstone.
The strata of calcareous breccia are composed of an infinite number
of sea-shells, from four to six inches in diameter, and in part
well preserved. We find they contain not ammonites, but
ampullaires, solens, and terebratulae. The greater part of these
shells are mixed: the oysters and pectinites being sometimes
arranged in families. The whole are easily detached, and their
interior is filled with fossil madrepores and cellepores.
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