Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Compact And
Cavernous Beds Contain Nests Of Brown Ochreous Iron; Possibly The Red
Earth (Tierra Colorada) So Much Sought
For by the coffee planters
(haciendados) owes its origin to the decomposition of some superficial
beds of oxidated iron, mixed
With silex and clay, or to a reddish
sandstone* (* Sandstone and ferruginous sand; iron-sand?) superposed
on limestone. The whole of this formation, which I shall designate by
the name of the limestone of Guines, to distinguish it from another
much more recent, forms, near Trinidad, in the Lomas of St. Juan,
steep declivities, resembling the mountains of limestone of Caripe, in
the vicinity of Cumana. They also contain great caverns, near Matanzas
and Jaruco, where I have not heard that any fossil bones have been
found. The frequency of caverns in which the pluvial waters
accumulate, and where small rivers disappear, sometimes causes a
sinking of the earth. I am of opinion that the gypsum of the island of
Cuba belongs not to tertiary but to secondary soil; it is worked in
several places on the east of Matanzas, at San Antonio de los Banos,
where it contains sulphur, and at the Cayos, opposite San Juan de los
Remedios. We must not confound with this limestone of Guines,
sometimes porous, sometimes compact, another formation so recent that
it seems to augment in our days. I allude to the calcareous
agglomerates, which I saw in the islands of Cayos that border the
coast between the Batabano and the bay of Xagua, principally south of
the Cienega de Zapata, Cayo Buenito, Cayo Flamenco and Cayo de
Piedras.
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