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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The Strong Vegetation Which Conceals The Soil, Renders
Also The Uniformity Of Its Level Less Perceptible; And The Plains Of
Caracas And La Plata Bear No Other Name.
The three basins we have just
described are called, in the language of the colonists, the Llanos of
Varinas and of Caracas, the bosques or selvas (forests) of the Amazon,
and the Pampas of Buenos Ayres.
The trees not only for the most part
cover the plains of the Amazon, from the Cordillera de Chiquitos, as
far as that of Parime; they also crown these two chains of mountains,
which rarely attain the height of the Pyrenees.* (* We must except the
most western part of the Cordillera of Chiquitos, between Cochabamba
and Santa Cruz de la Sierra where the summits are covered with snow;
but this colossal group almost belongs to the Andes de la Paz, of
which it forms a promontory or spur, directed toward the east.) On
this account, the vast plains of the Amazon, the Madeira, and the Rio
Negro, are not so distinctly bounded as the Llanos of Caracas, and the
Pampas of Buenos Ayres. As the region of forests comprises at once the
plains and the mountains, it extends from 18 degrees south to 7 and 8
degrees north,* (* To the west, in consequence of the Llanos of Manso,
and the Pampas de Huanacos, the forests do not extend generally beyond
the parallels of 18 or 19 degrees south latitude; but to the east, in
Brazil (in the capitanias of San Pablo and Rio Grande) as well as in
Paraguay, on the borders of the Parana, they advance as far as 25
degrees south.) and occupies an extent of near a hundred and twenty
thousand square leagues. This forest of South America, for in fact
there is only one, is six times larger than France. It is known to
Europeans only on the shores of a few rivers, by which it is
traversed; and has its openings, the extent of which is in proportion
to that of the forests. We shall soon skirt the marshy savannahs,
between the Upper Orinoco, the Conorichite, and the Cassiquiare, in
the latitude of 3 and 4 degrees. There are other openings, or as they
are called, clear savannahs,* (* Savannas limpias, that is to say,
clear of trees.) in the same parallel, between the sources of the Mao
and the Rio de Aguas Blancas, south of the Sierra de Pacaraima. These
last savannahs, which are inhabited by Caribs, and nomad Macusis, lie
near the frontiers of Dutch and French Guiana.
Having noticed the geological constitution of South America, we shall
now mark its principal features. The western coasts are bordered by an
enormous wall of mountains, rich in precious metals wherever volcanic
fire has not pierced through the eternal snow. This is the Cordillera
of the Andes. Summits of trap-porphyry rise beyond three thousand
three hundred toises, and the mean height of the chain* is one
thousand eight hundred and fifty toises. (* In New Grenada, Quito, and
Peru, according to measurements taken by Bouguer, La Condamine, and
myself.) It stretches in the direction of a meridian, and sends into
each hemisphere a lateral branch, in the latitudes of 10 degrees
north, and 16 and 18 degrees south. The first of these two branches,
that of the coast of Caracas, is of considerable length, and forms in
fact a chain. The second branch, the Cordillera of Chiquitos and of
the sources of the Guapore, is very rich in gold, and widens toward
the east, in Brazil, into vast tablelands, having a mild and temperate
climate. Between these two transverse chains, contiguous to the Andes,
an isolated group of granitic mountains is situated, from 3 to 7
degrees north latitude; which also runs parallel to the Equator, but,
not passing the meridian of 71 degrees, terminates abruptly towards
the west, and is not united to the Andes of New Grenada. These three
transverse chains have no active volcanoes; we know not whether the
most southern, like the two others, be destitute of trachytes or
trap-porphyry. None of their summits enter the limit of perpetual
snow; and the mean height of the Cordillera of La Parime, and of the
littoral chain of Caracas, does not reach six hundred toises, though
some of its summits rise fourteen hundred toises above the level of
the sea.* (* We do not reckon here, as belonging to the chain of the
coast, the Nevados and Paramos of Merida and of Truxillo, which are a
prolongation of the Andes of New Grenada.) The three transverse chains
are separated by plains entirely closed towards the west, and open
towards the east and south-east. When we reflect on their small
elevation above the surface of the ocean, we are tempted to consider
them as gulfs stretching in the direction of the current of rotation.
If, from the effect of some peculiar attraction, the waters of the
Atlantic were to rise fifty toises at the mouth of the Orinoco, and
two hundred toises at the mouth of the Amazon, the flood would
submerge more than the half of South America. The eastern declivity,
or the foot of the Andes, now six hundred leagues distant from the
coast of Brazil, would become a shore beaten by the waves. This
consideration is the result of a barometric measurement, taken in the
province of Jaen de Bracamoros, where the river Amazon issues from the
Cordilleras. I found the mean height of this immense river only one
hundred and ninety-four toises above the present level of the
Atlantic. The intermediate plains, however, covered with forests, are
still five times higher than the Pampas of Buenos Ayres, and the
grass-covered Llanos of Caracas and the Meta.
Those Llanos which form the basin of the Orinoco, and which we crossed
twice in one year, in the months of March and July, communicate with
the basin of the Amazon and the Rio Negro, bounded on one side by the
Cordillera of Chiquitos, and on the other by the mountains of Parime.
The opening which is left between the latter and the Andes of New
Grenada, occasions this communication.
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