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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This System Of Mountains, Which Is 160
Leagues Long,* Is A Prolongation Of The Eastern Cordillera Of The
Andes Of Cundinamarca.
(* It is more than double the length of the
Pyrenees, from Cape Creux to the point of Figuera.) There
Is an
immediate connection of the littoral chain with the Andes, like that
of the Pyrenees with the mountains of Asturia and Galicia; it is not
the effect of transversal ridges, like the connection of the Pyrenees
with the Swiss Alps, by the Black Mountain and the Cevennes. The
points of junction are between Truxillo and the lake of Valencia.
The eastern chain of New Grenada stretches north-east by the Sierra
Nevada de Merida, as well as by the four Paramos of Timotes, Niquitao,
Bocono and Las Rosas, of which the absolute height cannot be less than
from 1400 to 1600 toises. After the Paramo of Las Rosas, which is more
elevated than the two preceding, there is a great depression, and we
no longer see a distinct chain or ridge, but merely hills, and high
table-lands surrounding the towns of Tocuyo and Barquisimeto. We know
not the height even of Cerro del Altar, between Tocuyo and Caranacatu;
but we know by recent measures that the most inhabited spots are from
300 to 350 toises above sea-level. The limits of the mountainous land
between Tocuyo and the valleys of Aragua are, the plains of San Carlos
on the south, and the Rio Tocuyo on the north; the Rio Siquisique
flows into that river.
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