Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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If The Hot Valleys Of Aroa, Of Yaracuy, And Of The Rio Tocuyo,
Celebrated For Their Excellent Timber, Be Rendered Feverish By
Luxuriance Of Vegetation, And Extreme Atmospheric Humidity, It Is
Different In The Savannahs Of Monai And Carora.
These Llanos are
separated by the mountainous tract of Tocuyo and Nirgua from the great
plains of La Portuguesa and Calabozo.
It is very extraordinary to see
barren savannahs loaded with miasmata. No marshy ground is found
there, but several phenomena indicate a disengagement of hydrogen.* (*
What is that luminous phenomenon known under the name of the Lantern
(farol) of Maracaybo, which is perceived every night toward the
seaside as well as in the inland parts, at Merida for example, where
M. Palacios observed it during two years? The distance, greater than
40 leagues, at which the light is observed, has led to the supposition
that it might be owing to the effects of a thunderstorm, or of
electrical explosions which might daily take place in a pass in the
mountains. It is asserted that, on approaching the farol, the rolling
of thunder is heard. Others vaguely allege that it is an air-volcano,
and that asphaltic soils, like those of Mena, cause these inflammable
exhalations which are so constant in their appearance. The phenomenon
is observed on a mountainous and uninhabited spot, on the borders of
the Rio Catatumbo, near the junction with the Rio Sulia. The situation
of the farol is such that, being nearly in the meridian of the opening
(boca) of the lake of Maracaybo, navigators are guided by it as by a
lighthouse.) When travellers, who are not acquainted with natural
inflammable gases, are shown the Cueva del Serrito de Monai, the
people of the country love to frighten them by setting fire to the
gaseous combination which is constantly accumulated in the upper part
of the cavern.
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