Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Years 1799-1804, Vol.3 — 36 - Chapter 3.32, Part 6

2. INSULATED GROUP OF THE SNOWY MOUNTAINS OF SANTA MARTA.

In the enumeration of the different systems of mountains, I place this group before the littoral chain of Venezuela, though the latter, being a northern prolongation of the Cordillera of Cundinamarca, is immediately linked with the chain of the Andes.

The Sierra Nevado of Santa Marta is encompassed within two divergent branches of the Andes, that of Bogota, and that of the isthmus of Panama.

It rises abruptly like a fortified castle, amidst the plains extending from the gulf of Darien, by the mouth of the Magdalena, to the lake of Maracaybo.

The old geographers erroneously considered this insulated group of mountains covered with eternal snow, as the extremity of the high Cordilleras of Chita and Pamplona.

The loftiest ridge of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is only three or four leagues in length from east to west; it is bounded (at nine leagues distance from the coast) by the meridians of the capes of San Diego and San Augustin.

The culminant points, called El Picacho and Horqueta, are near the western border of the group; they are entirely separated from the peak of San Lorenzo, also covered with eternal snow, but only four leagues distant from the port of Santa Marta, towards the south-east.

I saw this latter peak from the heights that surrounded the village of Turbaco, south of Carthagena.

No precise measurement has hitherto given us the height of the Sierra Nevada, which Dampier affirms to be one of the highest mountains of the northern hemisphere.

Calculations founded on the maximum of distance at which the group is discerned at sea, give a height of more than 3004 toises.

That the group of the mountains of Santa Marta is insulated is proved by the hot climate of the lands (tierras calientes) that surround it.

Low ridges and a succession of hills indicate, perhaps, an ancient connection between the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta on one side, by the Alto de las Minas, with the phonolitic and granitic rocks of the Penon and Banca, and on the other, by the Sierra de Perija, with the mountains of Chiliguana and Ocana, which are the spurs of the eastern chain of the Andes of New Grenada.

In this latter chain, the febrifuge species of cinchona (corollis hirsutis, staminibus inclusis) are found in the Sierra Nevada de Merida; but the real cinchona, the most northern of South America, is found in the temperate region of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta.

3. LITTORAL CHAIN OF VENEZUELA.

This is the system of mountains the configuration and direction of which have excited so powerful an influence on the cultivation and commerce of the ancient Capitania General of Venezuela.

It bears different names, as the mountains of Coro, of Caracas, of the Bergantin, of Barcelona, of Cumana, and of Paria; but all these names belong to the same chain, of which the northern part runs along the coast of the Caribbean Sea.

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.

From the Cerro del Altar on the north-east towards Guigue and Valencia, succeed, as culminant points, the mountains of Santa Maria (between Buria and Nirgua); then the Picacho de Nirgua, supposed to be 600 toises high; and finally Las Palomeras and El Torito (between Valencia and Nirgua).

The line of water-partition runs from west to east, from Quibor to the lofty savannahs of London, near Santa Rosa.

The waters flow on the north, towards the Golfo triste of the Caribbean Sea; and on the south, towards the basins of the Apure and the Orinoco.

The whole of this mountainous country, by which the littoral chain of Caracas is linked to the Cordilleras of Cundinamarca, was celebrated in Europe in the middle of the nineteenth century; for that part of the territory formed of gneiss-granite, and lying between the Rio Tocuyo and the Rio Yaracui, contains the auriferous veins of Buria, and the copper-mine of Aroa which is worked at the present day.

If, across the knot of the mountains of Barquisimeto, we trace the meridians of Aroa, Nirgua and San Carlos, we find that on the north-west that knot is linked with the Sierra de Coro, and on the north-east with the mountains of Capadare, Porto Cabello and the Villa de Cura.

It may be said to form the eastern wall of that vast circular depression of which the lake of Maracaybo is the centre and which is bounded on the south and west by the mountains of Merida, Ocana, Perija and Santa Marta.

The littoral chain of Venezuela presents towards the centre and the east the same phenomena of structure as those observed in the Andes of Peru and New Grenada; namely, the division into several parallel ranges and the frequency of longitudinal basins or valleys.

But the irruptions of the Caribbean Sea having apparently overwhelmed, at a very remote period, a part of the mountains of the shore, the ranges or partial chains are interrupted and some basins have become oceanic gulfs.

To comprehend the Cordillera of Venezuela in mass we must carefully study the direction and windings of the coast from Punta Tucacas (west of Porto Cabello) as far as Punta de la Galera of the island of Trinidad.

That island, those of Los Testigos, Marguerita and Tortuga constitute, with the mica-slates of the peninsula of Araya, one and the same system of mountains.

The granitic rocks which appear between Buria, Duaca and Aroa cross the valley of the Rio Yaracui and draw near the shore, whence they extend, like a continuous wall, from Porto Cabello to Cape Codera.

This prolongation forms the northern chain of the Cordillera of Venezuela and is traversed in going from south to north, either from Valencia and the valleys of Aragua, to Burburata and Turiamo, or from Caracas to La Guayra.

Hot springs* issue from those mountains (* The other hot springs of the Cordillera of the shore are those of San Juan, Provisor, Brigantin, the gulf of Cariaco, Cumucatar and Irapa.

MM.

Rivero and Boussingault, who visited the thermal waters of Mariara in February, 1823, during their journey from Caracas to Santa Fe de Bogota, found their maximum to be 64 degrees centigrade.

I found it at the same season only 59. 2 degrees.

Has the great earthquake of the 26th March, 1812, had an influence on the temperature of these springs?

The able chemists above mentioned were, like myself, struck with the extreme purity of the hot waters that issue from the primitive rocks of the basin of Aragua.

Those of Onoto, which flow at the height of 360 toises above the level of the sea, have no smell of sulphuretted hydrogen; they are without taste, and cannot be precipitated, either by nitrate of silver or any other re-agent.

When evaporated they have an inappreciable residue which consists of a little silica and a trace of alkali; their temperature is only 44. 5 degrees, and the bubbles of air which are disengaged at intervals are at Onoto, as well as in the thermal waters of Mariara, pure nitrogen.

The waters of Mariara (244 toises) have a faint smell of sulphuretted hydrogen; they leave, by evaporation, a slight residuum, that yields carbonic acid, sulphuric acid, soda, magnesia and lime.

The quantities are so small that the water is altogether without taste.

In the course of my journey I found only the springs of Cumangillas hotter than the thermal waters of Las Trincheras: they are situated on the south of Porto Cabello.

The waters of Comangillas are at the height of 1040 toises and are alike remarkable for their purity and their temperature of 96. 3 degrees centigrade.

), those of Las Trincheras (90. 4 degrees) on its southern slope and those of Onoto and Mariara on its southern slope.

The former issue from a granite with large grains, very regularly stratified; the latter from a rock of gneiss.

What especially characterizes the northern chain is a summit which is not only the loftiest of the system of the mountains of Venezuela, but of all South America, on the east of the Andes.

The eastern summit of the Silla of Caracas, according to my barometric measurement made in 1800, is 1350 toises high,* (* The Silla of Caracas is only 80 toises lower than the Canigou in the Pyrenees.

) and notwithstanding the commotion which took place on the Silla during the great earthquake of Caracas, that mountain did not sink 50 or 60 toises, as some North American journals asserted.

Four or five leagues south of the northern chain (that of Mariara, La Silla and Cape Codera) the mountains of Guiripa, Ocumare and Panaquire form the southern chain of the coast, which stretches in a parallel direction from Guigue to the mouth of the Rio Tuy, by the Guesta of Yusma and the Guacimo.

The latitudes of the Villa de Cura and San Juan, so erroneously marked on our maps, enabled me to ascertain the mean breadth of the whole Cordillera of Venezuela.

Ten or twelve leagues may be reckoned as the distance from the descent of the northern chain which bounds the Caribbean Sea, to the descent of the southern chain bounding the immense basin of the Llanos.

This latter chain, which also bears the name of the Inland Mountains, is much lower than the northern chain; and I can hardly believe that the Sierra de Guayraima attains the height of 1200 toises.

The two partial chains, that of the interior, and that which runs along the coast, are linked by a ridge or knot of mountains known by the names of Altos de las Cocuyzas (845 toises) and the Higuerote (835 toises between Los Teques and La Victoria) in longitude 69 degrees 30 minutes and 69 degrees 50 minutes.

On the west of this ridge lies the enclosed basin* of the lake of Valencia or the Valles de Aragua (* This basin contains a small system of inland rivers which do not communicate with the ocean.

The southern chain of the litteral Cordillera of Venezuela is so depressed on the south-west that the Rio Pao is separated from the tributary streams of the lake of Tacarigua or Valencia.

Towards the east the Rio Tuy, which takes its rise on the western declivity of the knot of mountains of Las Cocuyzas, appears at first to empty itself into the valleys of Aragua; but hills of calcareous tufa, forming a ridge between Consejo and Victoria, force it to take its course south-east.

); and on the east the basin of Caracas and of the Rio Tuy.

The bottom of the first-mentioned basins is between 220 and 250 toises high; the bottom of the latter is 460 toises above the level of the Caribbean Sea.

It follows from these measures that the most western of the two longitudinal valleys enclosed by the littoral Cordillera is the deepest; while in the plains near the Apure and the Orinoco the declivity is from west to east; but we must not forget that the peculiar disposition of the bottom of the two basins, which are bounded by two parallel chains, is a local phenomenon altogether separate from the causes on which the general structure of the country depends.

The eastern basin of the Cordillera of Venezuela is not shut up like the basin of Valencia.

It is in the knot of the mountains of Las Cocuyzas, and of Higuerote, that the Serrania de los Teques and Oripoto, stretching eastward, form two valleys, those of the Rio Guayre and Rio Tuy; the former contains the town of Caracas and both unite below the Caurimare.

The Rio Tuy runs through the rest of the basin, from west to east, as far as its mouth which is situated on the north of the mountains of Panaquire.

Cape Codera seems to terminate the northern range of the littoral mountains of Venezuela but this termination is only apparent.

The coast forms a vast nook, thirty-five sea leagues in length, at the bottom of which is the mouth of the Rio Unare and the road of Nueva Barcelona.

Stretching first from west to east, in the parallel of 10 degrees 37 minutes, this coast recedes at the parallel 10 degrees 6 minutes, and resumes its original direction (10 degrees 37 minutes to 10 degrees 44 minutes) from the western extremity of the peninsula of Araya to the eastern extremities of Montana de Paria and the island of Trinidad.

From this dissection of the coast it follows that the range of mountains bordering the shore of the provinces of Caracas and Barcelona, between the meridian 66 degrees 32 minutes and 68 degrees 29 minutes (which I saw on the south of the bay of Higuerote and on the north of the Llanos of Pao and Cachipo), must be considered as the continuation of the southern chain of Venezuela and as being linked on the west with the Sierras de Panaquire and Ocumare.

It may therefore be said that between Cape Codera and Cariaco the inland chain itself forms the coast.

This range of very low mountains, often interrupted from the mouth of the Rio Tuy to that of the Rio Neveri, rises abruptly on the east of Nueva Barcelona, first in the rocky island of Chimanas, and then in the Cerro del Bergantin, elevated probably more than 800 toises, but of which the astronomical position and the precise height are yet alike unknown.

On the meridian of Cumana the northern chain (that of Cape Codera and the Silla of Caracas) again appears.

The micaceous slate of the peninsula of Araya and Maniquarez joins by the ridge or knot of mountains of Meapire the southern chain, that of Panaquire the Bergantin, Turimiquiri, Caripe and Guacharo.

This ridge, not more than 200 toises of absolute height, has, in the ancient revolutions of our planet, prevented the irruption of the ocean, and the union of the gulfs of Paria and Cariaco.

On the west of Cape Codera the northern chain, composed of primitive granitic rocks, presents the loftiest summits of the whole Cordillera of Venezuela;

but the culminant points east of that cape are composed in the southern chain of secondary calcareous rocks.

We have seen above that the peak of Turimiquiri, at the back of the Cocollar, is 1050 toises, while the bottoms of the high valleys of the convent of Caripe and of Guardia de San Augustin are 412 and 533 toises of absolute height.

On the east of the ridge of Meapire the southern chain sinks abruptly towards the Rio Arco and the Guarapiche; but, on quitting the main land, we again see it rising on the southern coast of the island of Trinidad which is but a detached portion of the continent, and of which the northern side unquestionably presents the vestiges of the northern chain of Venezuela, that is, of the Montana de Paria (the Paradise of Christopher Columbus), the peninsula of Araya and the Silla of Caracas.

The observations of latitude I made at the Villa de Cura (10 degrees 2 minutes 47 seconds), the farm of Cocollar (10 degrees 9 minutes 37 seconds) and the convent of Caripe (10 degrees 10 minutes 14 seconds), compared with the more anciently known position of the south coast of Trinidad (latitude 10 degrees 6 minutes), prove that the southern chain, south of the basins of Valencia and of Tuy* (* The bottom of the first of these four basins bounded by parallel chains is from 230 to 460 toises above, and that of the two latter from 30 to 40 toises below the present sea-level.

Hot springs gush from the bottom of the gulf of the basin of Cariaco, as from the bottom of the basin of Valencia on the continent.

) and of the gulfs of Cariaco and Paria, is still more uniform in the direction from west to east than the northern chain from Porto Cabello to Punta Galera.

It is highly important to know the southern limit of the littoral Cordillera of Venezuela because it determines the parallel at which the Llanos or the savannahs of Caracas, Barcelona and Cumana begin.

On some well-known maps we find erroneously marked between the meridians of Caracas and Cumana two Cordilleras stretching from north to south, as far as latitude 8 3/4 degrees, under the names of Cerros de Alta Gracia and del Bergantin, thus describing as mountainous a territory of 25 leagues broad, where we should seek in vain a hillock of a few feet in height.

Turning to the island of Marguerita, composed, like the peninsula of Araya, of micaceous slate, and anciently linked with that peninsula by the Morro de Chacopata and the islands of Coche and Cubagua, we seem to recognize in the two mountainous groups of Macanao and La Vega de San Juan traces of a third coast-chain of the Cordillera of Venezuela.

Do these two groups of Marguerita, of which the most westerly is above 600 toises high, belong to a submarine chain stretching by the isle of Tortuga, towards the Sierra de Santa Lucia de Coro, on the parallel of 11 degrees?

Must we admit that in latitude 11 1/4 and 12 1/2 degrees a fourth chain, the most northerly of all, formerly stretched out in the direction of the island of Hermanos, by Blanquilla, Los Roques, Orchila, Aves, Buen Ayre, Curacao and Oruba, towards Cape Chichivacoa?

These important problems can only be solved when the chain of islands parallel with the coast has been properly examined.

It must not be forgotten that a great irruption of the ocean appears to have taken place between Trinidad and Grenada,* and that no where else in the long series of the Lesser Antilles are two neighbouring islands so far removed from each other.

(* It is affirmed that the island of Trinidad is traversed in the northern part by a chain of primitive slate, and that Grenada furnishes basalt.

It would be important to examine of what rock the island of Tobago is composed; it appeared to me of dazzling whiteness; and on what point, in going from Trinidad northward, the trachytic and trappean system of the Lesser Antilles begins.

) We observe the effect of the rotatory current in the direction of the coast of Trinidad, as in the coasts of the provinces of Cumana and Caracas, between Cape Paria and Punta Araya and between Cape Codera and Porto Cabello.

If a part of the continent has been overwhelmed by the ocean on the north of the peninsula of Araya it is probable that the enormous shoal which surrounds Cubagua, Coche the island of Marguerita, Los Frailes, La Sola and the Testigos marks the extent and outline of the submerged land.

This shoal or placer, which is of the extent of 200 square leagues, is well known only to the tribe of the Guayqueries; it is frequented by these Indians on account of its abundant fishery in calm weather.

The Gran Placer is believed to be separated only by some canals or deep furrows of the bank of Grenada from the sand-bank that extends like a narrow dyke from Tobago to Grenada, and which is known by the lowering of the temperature of the water and from the sand-banks of Los Roques and Aves.

The Guayquerie Indians and, generally speaking, all the inhabitants of the coast of Cumana and Barcelona, are imbued with an idea that the water of the shoals of Marguerita and the Testigos diminishes from year to year; they believe that, in the lapse of ages, the Morro do Chacopata on the peninsula of Araya will be joined by a neck of land to the islands of Lobos and Coche.

The partial retreat of the waters on the coast of Cumana is undeniable and the bottom of the sea has been upheaved at various times by earthquakes; but these local phenomena, which it is so difficult to account for by the action of volcanic force, the changes in the direction of currents, and the consequent swelling of the waters, are very different from the effects manifested at once over the space of several hundred square leagues.