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
Noise Explains The Phenomena Of The Baxos Roncadores (Snoring
Bocabeoos), So Well Known To Navigators Who Cross From Jamaica
To the
mouth of Rio San Juan of Nicaragua, or to the island of San Andres.)
We are at first
Tempted to admit that the whole of this limestone
rock, which constitutes the principal portion of the island of Cuba,
may be traced to an uninterrupted operation of nature - to the action
of productive organic forces - an action which continues in our days in
the bosom of the ocean; but this apparent novelty of limestone
formations soon vanishes when we quit the shore, and recollect the
series of coral rocks which contain the formations of different ages,
the muschelkalk, the Jura limestone and coarse limestone. The same
coral rocks as those of the Castillo and La Punta are found in the
lofty inland mountains, accompanied with petrifications of bivalve
shells, very different from those now seen on the coasts of the
Antilles. Without positively assigning a determinate place in the
table of formations to the limestone of Guines, which is that of the
Castillo and La Punta, I have no doubt of the relative antiquity of
that rock with respect to the calcareous agglomerate of the Cayos,
situated south of Batabano, and east of the island of Pinos. The globe
has undergone great revolutions between the periods when these two
soils were formed; the one containing the great caverns of Matanzas,
the other daily augmenting by the agglutination of fragments of coral
and quartzose sand. On the south of the island of Cuba, the latter
soil seems to repose sometimes on the Jura limestone of Guines, as in
the Jardinillos, and sometimes (towards Cape Cruz) immediately over
primitive rocks. In the lesser Antilles the corals are covered with
volcanic productions. Several of the Cayos of the island of Cuba
contain fresh water; and I found this water very good in the middle of
the Cayo de Piedras. When we reflect on the extreme smallness of these
islands we can scarcely believe that the fresh-water wells are filled
with rain-water not evaporated. Do they prove a submarine
communication between the limestone of the coast with the limestone
serving as the basis of lithophyte polypi, and is the fresh water of
Cuba raised up by hydrostatic pressure across the coral rocks of
Cayos, as it is in the bay of Xagua, where, in the middle of the sea,
it forms springs frequented by the lamantins?
The secondary formations on the east of the Havannah are pierced in a
singular manner by syenitic and euphotide rocks united in groups. The
southern bottom of the bay as well as the northern part (the hills of
the Morro and the Cabana) are of Jura limestone; but on the eastern
bank of the two Ensenadas de Regla and Guanabacoa, the whole is
transition soil. Going from north to south, and first near Marimelena,
we find syenite consisting of a great quantity of hornblende, partly
decomposed, a little quartz, and a reddish-white feldspar seldom
crystallized. This fine syenite, the strata of which incline to the
north-west, alternates twice with serpentine. The layers of
intercalated serpentine are three toises thick. Farther south, towards
Regla and Guanabacoa, the syenite disappears, and the whole soil is
covered with serpentine, rising in hills from thirty to forty toises
high, and running from east to west. This rock is much fendillated,
externally of a bluish-grey, covered with dendrites of manganese, and
internally of leek and asparagus-green, crossed by small veins of
asbestos. It contains no garnet or amphibole, but metalloid diallage
disseminated in the mass. The serpentine is sometimes of an
esquillous, sometimes of a conchoidal fracture: this was the first
time I had found metalloid diallage within the tropics. Several blocks
of serpentine have magnetic poles; others are of such a homogeneous
texture, and have such a glossiness, that at a distance they may be
taken for pechstein (resinite). It were to be wished that these fine
masses were employed in the arts as they are in several parts of
Germany. In approaching Guanabacoa we find serpentine crossed by veins
between twelve and fourteen inches thick, and filled with fibrous
quartz, amethyst, and fine mammelonnes, and stalactiforme
chalcedonies; it is possible that chrysoprase may also one day be
found. Some copper pyrites appear among these veins accompanied, it is
said, by silvery-grey copper. I found no traces of this grey copper:
it is probably the metalloid diallage that has given the Cerro de
Guanabacoa the reputation of riches in gold and silver which it has
enjoyed for ages. In some places petroleum flows* from rents in the
serpentine. (* Does there exist in the Bay of the Havannah any other
source of petroleum than that of Guanabacoa, or must it be admitted
that the betun liquido, which in 1508 was employed by Sebastian de
Ocampo for the caulking of ships, is dried up? That spring, however,
fixed the attention of Ocampo on the port of the Havannah, where he
gave it the name of Puerto de Carenas. It is said that abundant
springs of petroleum are also found in the eastern part of the island
(Manantialis de betun y chapapote) between Holguin and Mayari, and on
the coast of Santiago de Cuba.) Springs of water are frequent; they
contain a little sulphuretted hydrogen, and deposit oxide of iron. The
Baths of Bareto are agreeable, but of nearly the same temperature as
the atmosphere. The geologic constitution of this group of serpentine
rocks, from its insulated position, its veins, its connection with
syenite and the fact of its rising up across shell-formations, merits
particular attention. Feldspar with a basis of souda (compact
feldspar) forms, with diallage, the euphotide and serpentine; with
pyroxene, dolerite and basalt; and with garnet, eclogyte. These five
rocks, dispersed over the whole globe, charged with oxidulated and
titanious iron, are probably of similar origin. It is easy to
distinguish two formations in the euphotide; one is destitute of
amphibole, even when it alternates with amphibolic rocks (Joria in
Piedmont, Regla in the island of Cuba) rich in pure serpentine, in
metalloid diallage and sometimes in jasper (Tuscany, Saxony); the
other, strongly charged with amphibole, often passing to diorite,* has
no jasper in layers, and sometimes contains rich veins of copper;
(Silesia, Mussinet in Piedmont, the Pyrenees, Parapara in Venezuela,
Copper Mountains of North America). (* On a serpentine that flows like
a penombre, veins of greenstone (diorite) near Lake Clunie in
Perthshire.
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