Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.


































































































































 -  The
granite of those countries, owing to the position of the thin laminae
of black mica, sometimes resembles graphic granite - Page 508
Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland. - Page 508 of 777 - First - Home

Enter page number    Previous Next

Number of Words to Display Per Page: 250 500 1000

The Granite Of Those Countries, Owing To The Position Of The Thin Laminae Of Black Mica, Sometimes Resembles Graphic Granite; But Most Frequently (And This Determines The Age Of Its Formation) It Passes Into A Real Gneiss.

Its beds, very regularly stratified, run from south-west to north-east, as in the Cordillera on the shore of Caracas.

The dip of the granite-gneiss is 70 degrees north-west. It is traversed by an infinite number of veins of quartz, which are singularly transparent, and three or four, and sometimes fifteen inches thick. I found no cavity (druse), no crystallized substance, not even rock-crystal; and no trace of pyrites, or any other metallic substance. I enter into these particulars on account of the chimerical ideas that have been spread ever since the sixteenth century, after the voyages of Berreo and Raleigh,* "on the immense riches of the great and fine empire of Guiana." (* Raleigh's work bears the high sounding title of The Discovery of the large, rich, and beautiful Empire of Guiana, London 1596. See also Raleghi admiranda Descriptio Regni Guianae, auri abundantissimi, Hondius Noribergae 1599.)

The river Atabapo presents throughout a peculiar aspect; you see nothing of its real banks formed by flat lands eight or ten feet high; they are concealed by a row of palms, and small trees with slender trunks, the roots of which are bathed by the waters. There are many crocodiles from the point where you quit the Orinoco to the mission of San Fernando, and their presence indicates that this part of the river belongs to the Rio Guaviare and not to the Atabapo.

Enter page number   Previous Next
Page 508 of 777
Words from 137929 to 138200 of 211397


Previous 508 509 510 511 512 513 514 515 516 517 Next

More links: First 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
 110 120 130 140 150 160 170 180 190 200
 210 220 230 240 250 260 270 280 290 300
 310 320 330 340 350 360 370 380 390 400
 410 420 430 440 450 460 470 480 490 500
 510 520 530 540 550 560 570 580 590 600
 610 620 630 640 650 660 670 680 690 700
 710 720 730 740 750 760 770 Last

Display Words Per Page: 250 500 1000

 
Africa (29)
Asia (27)
Europe (59)
North America (58)
Oceania (24)
South America (8)
 

List of Travel Books RSS Feeds

Africa Travel Books RSS Feed

Asia Travel Books RSS Feed

Europe Travel Books RSS Feed

North America Travel Books RSS Feed

Oceania Travel Books RSS Feed

South America Travel Books RSS Feed

Copyright © 2005 - 2022 Travel Books Online