Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Years 1799-1804, Vol.3 — 32 - Chapter 3.32, Part 2

A.

SYSTEMS OF MOUNTAINS.

A.

1. CORDILLERAS OF THE ANDES.

This is the most continuous, the longest, the most uniform in its direction from south to north and north-north-west, of any chain of the globe.

It approaches the north and south poles at unequal distances of from 22 to 33 degrees.

Its development is from 2800 to 3000 leagues (20 to a degree), a length equal to the distance from Cape Finisterre in Galicia to the north-east cape (Tschuktschoi-Noss) of Asia.

Somewhat less than one half of this chain belongs to South America, and runs along its western shores.

North of the isthmus of Cupica and of Panama, after an immense lowering, it assumes the appearance of a nearly central ridge, forming a rocky dyke that joins the great continent of North America to the southern continent.

The low lands on the east of the Andes of Guatimala and New Spain appear to have been overwhelmed by the ocean and now form the bottom of the Caribbean Sea.

As the continent beyond the parallel of Florida again widens towards the east, the Cordilleras of Durango and New Mexico, as well as the Rocky Mountains, merely a continuation of those Cordilleras, appear to be thrown still further westward, that is, towards the coast of the Pacific Ocean; but they still remain eight or ten times more remote from it than in the southern hemisphere.

We may consider as the two extremities of the Andes, the rock or granitic island of Diego Ramirez, south of Cape Horn, and the mountains lying at the mouth of Mackenzie River (latitude 69 degrees, longitude 130 1/2 degrees), more than twelve degrees west of the greenstone mountains, known by the name of the Copper Mountains, visited by Captain Franklin.

The colossal peak of Saint Elias and that of Mount Fairweather, in New Norfolk, do not, properly speaking, belong to the northern prolongation of the Cordilleras of the Andes, but to a parallel chain (the maritime Alps of the north-west coast), stretching towards the peninsula of California, and connected by transversal ridges with a mountainous land, between 45 and 53 degrees of latitude, with the Andes of New Mexico (Rocky Mountains).

In South America the mean breadth of the Cordillera of the Andes is from 18 to 22 leagues.

* (* The breadth of this immense chain is a phenomenon well worthy of attention.

The Swiss Alps extend, in the Grisons and in the Tyrol, to a breadth of 36 and 40 leagues, both in the meridians of the lake at Como, the canton of Appenzell, and in the meridian of Bassano and Tegernsee.

) It is only in the knots of the mountains, that is where the Cordillera is swelled by side-groups or divided into several chains nearly parallel, and reuniting at intervals, for instance, on the south of the lake of Titicaca, that it is more than 100 to 120 leagues broad, in a direction perpendicular to its axis.

The Andes of South America bound the plains of the Orinoco, the Amazon, and the Rio de la Plata, on the west, like a rocky wall raised across a crevice 1300 leagues long, and stretching from south to north.

This upheaved part (if I may be permitted to use an expression founded on a geological hypothesis) comprises a surface of 58,900 square leagues, between the parallel of Cape Pilesar and the northern Choco.

To form an idea of the variety of rocks which this space may furnish for the observation of the traveller, we must recollect that the Pyrenees, according to the observations of M. Charpentier, occupy only 768 square sea leagues.

The name of Andes in the Quichua language (which wants the consonants d, f, and g) Antis, or Ante, appears to me to be derived from the Peruvian word anta, signifying copper or metal in general.

Anta chacra signifies mine of copper; antacuri, copper mixed with gold; and puca anta, copper, or red metal.

As the group of the Altai mountains* takes its name from the Turkish word altor or altyn (* Klaproth.

Asia polyglotta page 211. It appears to me less probable that the tribe of the Antis gave its name to the mountains of Peru.

), in the same manner the Cordilleras may have been termed "Copper-country," or Anti-suyu, on account of the abundance of that metal, which the Peruvians employed for their tools.

The Inca Garcilasso, who was the son of a Peruvian princess, and who wrote the history of his native country in the first years of the conquest, gives no etymology of the name of the Andes.

He only opposes Anti-suyu, or the region of summits covered with eternal snow (ritiseca), to the plains or Yuncas, that is, to the lower region of Peru.

The etymology of the name of the largest mountain chain of the globe cannot be devoid of interest to the mineralogic geographer.

The structure of the Cordillera of the Andes, that is, its division into several chains nearly parallel, which are again joined by knots of mountains, is very remarkable.

On our maps this structure is indicated but imperfectly; and what La Condamine and Bouguer merely guessed, during their long visit to the table-land of Quito, has been generalized and ill-interpreted by those who have described the whole chain according to the type of the equatorial Andes.

The following is the most accurate information I could collect by my own researches and an active correspondence of twenty years with the inhabitants of Spanish America.

The group of islands called Tierra del Fuego, in which the chain of the Andes begins, is a plain extending from Cape Espiritu Santo as far as the canal of San Sebastian.

The country on the west of this canal, between Cape San Valentino and Cape Pilares, is bristled with granitic mountains covered (from the Morro de San Agueda to Cabo Redondo) with calcareous shells.

Navigators have greatly exaggerated the height of the mountains of Tierra del Fuego, among which there appears to be a volcano still burning.

M.

de Churruca found the height of the western peak of Cape Pilares (latitude 52 degrees 45 minutes south) only 218 toises; even Cape Horn is probably not more than 500 toises* high.

(* It is very distinctly seen at the distance of 60 miles, which, without calculating the effects of terrestrial refraction, would give it a height of 498 toises.

) The plain extends on the northern shore of the Straits of Magellan, from the Virgin's Cape to Cabo Negro; at the latter the Cordilleras rise abruptly, and fill the whole space as far as Cape Victoria (latitude 52 degrees 22 minutes).

The region between Cape Horn and the southern extremity of the continent somewhat resembles the origin of the Pyrenees between Cape Creux (near the gulf of Rosas) and the Col des Perdus.

The height of the Patagonian chain is not known; it appears, however, that no summit south of the parallel of 48 degrees attains the elevation of the Canigou (1430 toises) which is near the eastern extremity of the Pyrenees.

In that southern country, where the summers are so cold and short, the limit of eternal snow must lower at least as much as in the northern hemisphere, in Norway, in latitude 63 and 64 degrees; consequently below 800 toises.

The great breadth, therefore, of the band of snow that envelopes these Patagonian summits, does not justify the idea which travellers form of their height in 40 degrees south latitude.

As we advance towards the island of Chiloe, the Cordilleras draw near the coast; and the archipelago of Chonos or Huaytecas appears like the vestiges of an immense group of mountains overwhelmed by water.

Narrow estuaries fill the lower valleys of the Andes, and remind us of the fjords of Norway and Greenland.

We there find, running from south to north, the Nevados de Maca (latitude 45 degrees 19 minutes), of Cuptano (latitude 44 degrees 58 minutes), of Yanteles (latitude 43 degrees 52 minutes), of Corcovado, Chayapirca (latitude 42 degrees 52 minutes) and of Llebean (latitude 41 degrees 49 minutes).

The peak of Cuptana rises like the peak of Teneriffe, from the bosom of the sea; but being scarcely visible at thirty-six or forty leagues distance, it cannot be more than 1500 toises high.

Corcovado, situated on the coast of the continent, opposite the southern point of the island of Chiloe, appears to be more than 1950 toises high; it is perhaps the loftiest summit of the whole globe, south of the parallel of 42 degrees south latitude.

On the north of San Carlos de Chiloe, in the whole length of Chile to the desert of Atacama, the low western regions not having been overwhelmed by floods, the Andes there appear farther from the coast.

The Abbe Molina affirms that the Cordilleras of Chile form three parallel chains, of which the intermediary is the most elevated;

but to prove that this division is far from general, it suffices to recollect the barometric survey made by MM.

Bauza and Espinosa, in 1794, between Mendoza and Santiago de Chile.

The road leading from one of those towns to the other, rises gradually from 700 to 1987 toises;

and after passing the Col des Andes (La Cumbre, between the houses of refuge called Las Calaveras and Las Cuevas), it descends continually as far as the temperate valley of Santiago de Chile, of which the bottom is only 409 toises above the level of the sea.

The same survey has made known the minimum of height at Chile of the lower limit of snow, in 33 degrees south latitude.

The limit does not lower in summer to 2000 toises.

* (* On the southern declivity of the Himalayas snow begins (3 degrees nearer the equator) at 1970 toises.

) I think we may conclude according to the analogy of the Snowy Mountains of Mexico and southern Europe, and considering the difference of the summer temperature of the two hemispheres, that the real Nevadas at Chile, in the parallel of Valdivia (latitude 40 degrees), cannot be below 1300 toises; in Valparaiso (latitude 33 degrees) not lower than 2000 toises, and in that of Copiapo (latitude 27 degrees) not below 2200 toises of height.

These are the limit-numbers, the minimum of elevation, which the ridge of the Andes of Chile must attain in different degrees of latitude, to enable their summits to rise above the line of perpetual snow.

The numerical results which I have just marked and which are founded on the laws of distribution of heat, have still the same importance which they possessed at the time of my travels in America; for there does not exist in the immense extent of the Andes, from 8 degrees south latitude to the Straits of Magellan, one Nevada of which the height above the sea-level has been determined, either by a simple geometric measure, or by the combined means of barometric and geodesic measurements.

Between 33 and 18 degrees south latitude, between the parallels of Valparaiso and Arica, the Andes present towards the east three remarkable spurs, the Sierra de Cordova, the Sierra de Salta, and the Nevados de Cochabamba.

Travellers partly cross and partly go along the side of the Sierra de Cordova (between 33 and 31 degrees of latitude) in their way from Buenos Ayres to Mendoza; it may be said to be the most southern promontory which advances, in the Pampas, towards the meridian of 65 degrees; it gives birth to the great river known by the name of Desaguadero de Mendoza and extends from San Juan de la Frontera and San Juan de la Punta to the town of Cordova.

The second spur, called the Sierra de Salta and the Jujui, of which the greatest breadth is 25 degrees of latitude, widens from the valley of Catamarca and San Miguel del Tucuman, in the direction of the Rio Vermejo (longitude 64 degrees).

Finally, the third and most majestic spur, the Sierra Nevada de Cochabamba and Santa Cruz (from 22 to 17 1/2 degrees of latitude), is linked with the knot of the mountains of Porco.

It forms the points of partition (divortia aquarum, between the basin of the Amazon and that of the Rio de la Plata.

The Cachimayo and the Pilcomayo, which rise between Potosi, Talavera de la Puna, and La Plata or Chuquisaca, run in the direction of south-east, while the Parapiti and the Guapey (Guapaiz, or Rio de Mizque) pour their waters into the Mamori, to north-east.

The ridge of partition being near Chayanta, south of Mizque, Tomina and Pomabamba, nearly on the southern declivity of the Sierra de Cochabamba in latitude 19 and 20 degrees, the Rio Guapey flows round the whole group, before it reaches the plains of the Amazon, as in Europe the Poprad, a tributary of the Vistula, makes a circuit in its course from the southern part of the Carpathians to the plains of Poland.

I have already observed above, that where the mountains cease (west* of the meridian of 66 1/2 degrees (* I agree with Captain Basil Hall, in fixing the port of Valparaiso in 71 degrees 31 minutes west of Greenwich, and I place Cordova 8 degrees 40 minutes, and Santa Cruz de la Sierra 7 degrees 4 minutes east of Valparaiso.

The longitudes mentioned in the text refer always to the meridian of the Observatory of Paris.

)) the partition ridge of Cochabamba goes up towards the north-east, to 16 degrees of latitude, forming, by the intersection of two slightly inclined planes, only one ridge amidst the savannahs, and separating the waters of the Guapore, a tributary of the Madeira, from those of the Aguapehy and Jauru, tributaries of the Rio Paraguay.

This vast country between Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Villabella, and Matogrosso, is one of the least known parts of South America.

The two spurs of Cordova and Salta present only a mountainous territory of small elevation, and linked to the foot of the Andes of Chile.

Cochabamba, on the contrary, attains the limit of perpetual snow (2300 toises) and forms in some sort a lateral branch of the Cordilleras, diverging even from their tops between La Paz and Oruro.

The mountains composing this branch (the Cordillera de Chiriguanaes, de los Sauces and Yuracarees) extend regularly from west to east; their eastern declivity* is very rapid, and their loftiest summits are not in the centre, but in the northern part of the group.

(* For much information concerning the Sierra de Cochabamba I am indebted to the manuscripts of my countryman, the celebrated botanist Taddeus Haenke, which a monk of the congregation of the Escurial, Father Cisneros, kindly communicated to me at Lima.

Mr. Haenke, after having followed the expedition of Alexander Malaspina, settled at Cochabamba in 1798. A part of the immense herbal of this botanist is now at Prague.

) The principal Cordillera of Chile and Upper Peru is, for the first time, ramified very distinctly into two branches, in the group of Porco and Potosi, between latitude 19 and 20 degrees.

These two branches comprehend the table-land extending from Carangas to Lamba (latitude 19 3/4 to 15 degrees) and in which is situated the small mountain lake of Paria, the Desaguadero, and the great Laguna of Titicaca or Chucuito, of which the western part bears the name of Vinamarca.

To afford an idea of the colossal dimensions of the Andes, I may here observe that the surface of the lake of Titicaca alone (448 square sea leagues) is twenty times greater than that of the Lake of Geneva, and twice the average extent of a department of France.

On the banks of this lake, near Tiahuanacu, and in the high plains of Callao, ruins are found which bear evidence of a state of civilization anterior to that which the Peruvians assign to the reign of the Inca Manco Capac.

The eastern Cordillera, that of La Paz, Palca, Ancuma, and Pelechuco, join, north-west of Apolobamba, the western Cordillera, which is the most extensive of the whole chain of the Andes, between the parallels 14 and 15 degrees.

The imperial city of Cuzco is situated near the eastern extremity of this knot, which comprehends, in an area of 3000 square leagues, the mountains of Vilcanota, Carabaya, Abancai, Huando, Parinacochas, and Andahuaylas.

Though here, as in general, in every considerable widening of the Cordillera, the grouped summits do not follow the principal axis in uniform and parallel directions, a phenomenon observable in the general disposition of the chain of the Andes, from latitude 18 degrees, is well worthy the attention of geologists.

The whole mass of the Cordilleras of Chile and Upper Peru, from the Straits of Magellan to the parallel of the port of Arica (18 degrees 28 minutes 35 seconds), runs from south to north, in the direction of a meridian at most 5 degrees north-east; but from the parallel of Arica, the coast and the two Cordilleras east and west of the Alpine lake of Titicaca, abruptly change their direction and incline to north-west.

The Cordilleras of Ancuma and Moquehua, and the longitudinal valley, or rather the basin of Titicaca, which they inclose, take a direction north 42 degrees west.

Further on, the two branches again unite in the group of the mountains of Cuzco, and thence their direction is north 80 degrees west.

This group of which the table-land inclines to the north-east, forms a curve, nearly from east to west, so that the part of the Andes north of Castrovireyna is thrown back more than 242,000 toises westward.

This singular geological phenomenon resembles the variation of dip of the veins, and especially of the two parts of the chain of the Pyrenees, parallel to each other, and linked by an almost rectangular elbow, 16,000 toises long, near the source of the Garonne;* (* Between the mountain of Tentenade and the Port d'Espot.

);

but in the Andes, the axes of the chain, south and north of the curve, do not preserve parallelism.

On the north of Castrovireyna and Andahuaylas (latitude 14 degrees), the direction is north 22 degrees west, while south of 15 degrees, it is north 42 degrees west.

The inflexions of the coast follow these changes.

The shore separated from the Cordillera by a plain 15 leagues in breadth, stretches from Camapo to Arica, between 27 1/2 and 18 1/2 degrees latitude north 5 degrees east; from Arica to Pisco, between 18 1/2 and 14 degrees latitude at first north 42 degrees west, afterwards north 65 degrees west; and from Pisco to Truxillo, between 14 and 8 degrees of latitude north 27 degrees west.

The parallelism between the coast and the Cordillera of the Andes is a phenomenon the more worthy of attention, as it occurs in several parts of the globe where the mountains do not in the same manner form the shore.

After the great knot of mountains of Cuzco and Parinacochas, in 14 degrees south latitude, the Andes present a second bifurcation, on the east and west of the Rio Jauja, which throws itself into the Mantaro, a tributary stream of the Apurimac.

The eastern chain stretches on the east of Huanta, the convent of Ocopa and Tarma; the western chain, on the west of Castrovireyna, Huancavelica, Huarocheri, and Yauli.

The basin, or rather the lofty table-land which is inclosed by these chains, is nearly half the length of the basin of Chucuito or Titicaca.

Two mountains covered with eternal snow, seen from the town of Lima, and which the inhabitants name Toldo de la Nieve, belong to the western chain, that of Huarocheri.

North-west of the valleys of Salcabamba, in the parallel of the ports of Huaura and Guarmey, between 11 and 10 degrees latitude, the two chains unite in the knot of the Huanuco and the Pasco, celebrated for the mines of Yauricocha or Santa Rosa.

There rise two peaks of colossal height, the Nevados of Sasaguanca and of La Viuda.

The table-land of this knot of mountains appears in the Pambas de Bombon to be more than 1800 toises above the level of the ocean.

From this point, on the north of the parallel of Huanuco (latitude 11 degrees), the Andes are divided into three chains: the first, and most eastern, rises between Pozuzu and Muna, between the Rio Huallaga, and the Rio Pachitea, a tributary of the Ucayali; the second, or central, is between the Huallaga, and the Upper Maranon; the third, or western, between the Upper Maranon and the coast of Truxillo and Payta.

The eastern chain is a small lateral branch which lowers into a range of hills: its direction is first north-north-east, bordering the Pampas del Sacramento, afterwards it turns west-north-west, where it is broken by the Rio Huallaga, in the Pongo, above the confluence of Chipurana, and then it loses itself in latitude 6 1/4 degrees, on the north-west of Lamas.

A transversal ridge seems to connect it with the central chain, south of Paramo de Piscoguanuna (or Piscuaguna), west of Chachapoyas.

The intermediary or central chain stretches from the knot of Pasco and Huanuco, towards north-north-west, between Xican and Chicoplaya, Huacurachuco and the sources of the Rio Monzan, between Pataz and Pajatan, Caxamarquilla and Moyobamba.

It widens greatly in the parallel of Chachapoyas, and forms a mountainous territory, traversed by deep and extremely hot valleys.

On the north of the Paramo de Piscoguanuna (latitude 6 degrees) the central chain throws two branches in the direction of La Vellaca and San Borja.

We shall soon see that this latter branch forms, below the Rio Neva a tributary stream of the Amazon, the rocks that border the famous Pongo de Manseriche.

In this zone, where North Peru approximates to the confines of New Grenada in latitude 10 and 5 degrees, no summit of the eastern and central chains rises as high as the region of perpetual snow; the only snowy summits are in the western chain.

The central chain, that of the Paramos de Callacalla, and Piscoguanuna, scarcely attains 1800 toises, and lowers gently to 800 toises; so that the mountainous and temperate tract of country which extends on the north of Chachapoyas towards Pomacocha, La Vellaca and the source of the Rio Nieva is rich in fine cinchona trees.

After having passed the Rio Huallaga and the Pachitea, which with the Beni forms the Ucayali, we find, in advancing towards the east, only ranges of hills.

The western chain of the Andes, which is the most elevated and nearest to the coast, runs almost parallel with the shore north 22 degrees west, between Caxatambo and Huary, Conchucos and Guamachuco, by Caxamarca, the Paramo de Yanaguanga, and Montan, towards the Rio de Guancabamba.

It comprises (between 9 and 7 1/2 degrees) the three Nevados de Pelagatos, Moyopata and Huaylillas.

This last snowy summit, situated near Guamachuco (in 7 degrees 55 minutes latitude), is the more remarkable, since from thence on the north, as far as Chimborazo, on a length of 140 leagues, there is not one mountain that enters the region of perpetual snow.

This depression, or absence of snow, extends in the same interval, over all the lateral chains; while, on the south of the Nevado de Huaylillas, it always happens that when one chain is very low, the summits of the other exceed the height of 2460 toises.

It was on the south of Micuipampa (latitude 7 degrees 1 minute) that I found the magnetic equator.

The Amazon, or as it is customary to say in those regions, the Upper Maranon, flows through the western part of the longitudinal valley lying between the Cordilleras of Chachapayas and Caxamarca.

Comprehending in one point of view, this valley, and that of the Rio Jauja, bounded by the Cordilleras of Tarma and Huarocheri, we are inclined to consider them as one immense basin 180 leagues long, and crossed in the first third of its length, by a dyke, or ridge 18,000 toises broad.

In fact, the two alpine lakes of Lauricocha and Chinchaycocha, where the river Amazon and the Rio de Jauja take their rise, are situated south and north of this rocky dyke, which is a prolongation of the knot of Huanuco and Pasco.

The Amazon, on issuing from the longitudinal valley which bounds the chains of Caxamarca and Chachacocha, breaks the latter chain; and the point where the great river penetrates the mountains, is very remarkable.

Entering the Amazon by the Rio Chamaya or Guancabamba, I found opposite the confluence, the picturesque mountain of Patachuana; but the rocks on both banks of the Amazon begin only between Tambillo and Tomependa (latitude 5 degrees 31 minutes, longitude 80 degrees 56 minutes).

From thence to the Pongo de Rentema, a long succession of rocks follow, of which the last is the Pongo de Tayouchouc, between the strait of Manseriche and the village of San Borja.

The course of the Amazon, which is first directed north, then east, changes near Puyaya, three leagues north-east of Tomependa.

Throughout the whole distance between Tambillo and San Borja, the waters force a way, more or less narrow, across the sandstones of the Cordillera of Chachapoyas.

The mountains are lofty near the Embarcadero, at the confluence of the Imasa, where large trees of cinchona, which might be easily transplanted to Cayenne, or the Canaries, approach the Amazon.

The rocks in the famous strait of Manseriche are scarcely 40 toises high; and further eastward the last hills rise near Xeberos, towards the mouth of the Rio Huallaga.