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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I Saw In The Plains Of Jaen
De Bracamoros A Sandstone Which Alternates With Ledges Of Sand And
Conglomerate Nodules Of Porphyry And Lydian Stone.
MM.
Spix and
Martius affirm that the banks of the Rio Negro on the south of the
equator are composed of variegated sandstone; those of the Rio Branco,
Jupura and Apoporis of quadersandstein; and those of the Amazon, on
several points, of ferruginous sandstone.* (* Braunes eisenschussiges
Sandstein-Conglomerat (Iron-sand of the English geologists, between
the Jura limestone and green sandstone.) MM. Spix and Martius found on
rocks of quadersandstein, between the Apoporis and the Japura, the
same sculptures which we have pointed out from the Essequibo to the
plains of Cassiquiare, and which seem to prove the migrations of a
people more advanced in civilization than the Indians who now inhabit
those countries.) It remains to examine if (as I am inclined to
suppose) the limestone and gypsum formations of the eastern part of
the littoral Cordillera of Venezuela differ entirely from those of the
Llanos, and to what series belongs that rocky wall* named the Galera,
which bounds the steppes of Calabozo towards the north? (* Is this
wall a succession of rocks of dolomite or a dyke of quadersandstein,
like the Devil's Wall (Teufelsmauer), at the foot of the Hartz?
Calcareous shelves (coral banks), either ledges of sandstone (effects
of the revulsion of the waves) or volcanic eruptions, are commonly
found on the borders of great plains, that is, on the shores of
ancient inland seas. The Llanos of Venezuela furnish examples of such
eruptions near Para(?) like Harudje (Mons Ater, Plin.) on the northern
boundary of the African desert (the Sahara). Hills of sandstone rising
like towers, walls and fortified castles and offering great analogy to
quadersandstein, bound the American desert towards the west, on the
south of Arkansas.) The basin of the steppes is itself the bottom of a
sea destitute of islands; it is only on the south of the Apure,
between that river and the Meta, near the western bank of the Sierra,
that a few hills appear, as Monte Parure, la Galera de Sinaruco and
the Cerritos de San Vicente. With the exception of the fragments of
tertiary strata above mentioned there is, from the equator to the
parallel of 10 degrees north (between the meridian of Sierra Nevada de
Merida and the coast of Guiana), if not an absence, at least a
scarcity of those petrifactions, which strikes an observer recently
arrived from Europe.
The maxima of the height of the different formations diminish
regularly in the country we are describing with their relative ages.
These maxima, for gneiss-granite (Peak of Duida in the group of
Parime, Silla de Caracas in the coast chain) are from 1300 to 1350
toises; for the limestone of Cumanacoa (summit or Cucurucho of
Turimiquiri), 1050 toises; for the limestone of Caripe (mountains
surrounding the table-land of the Guarda de San Augustin), 750 toises;
for the sandstone alternating with the limestone of Cumanacoa
(Cuchilla de Guanaguana), 550 toises; for the tertiary strata (Punta
Araya), 200 toises.
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