To take the shortest road from Caracas to the banks of the Orinoco, we should have crossed the southern chain of mountains between Baruta, Salamanca, and the savannahs of Ocumare, passed over the steppes or llanos of Orituco, and embarked1 at Cabruta, near the mouth of the Rio Guarico. But this direct route would have deprived us of the opportunity of surveying the valleys of Aragua, which are the finest and most cultivated portion of the province; of taking the level of an important part of the chain of the coast by means of the barometer2; and of descending4 the Rio Apure as far as its junction5 with the Orinoco. A traveller who has the intention of studying the configuration6 and natural productions of a country is not guided by distances, but by the peculiar7 interest attached to the regions he may traverse. This powerful motive8 led us to the mountains of Los Teques, to the hot springs of Mariara, to the fertile banks of the lake of Valencia, and through the immense savannahs of Calabozo to San Fernando de Apure, in the eastern part of the province of Varinas. Having determined9 on this route, our first direction was westward10, then southward, and finally to east-south-east, so that we might enter the Orinoco by the Apure in latitude11 7° 36′ 23″.
On the day on which we quitted the capital of Venezuela, we reached the foot of the woody mountains which close the valley on the south-west. There we halted for the night, and on the following day we proceeded along the right bank of the Rio Guayra as far as the village of Antimano, by a very fine road, partly scooped13 out of the rock. We passed by La Vega and Carapa. The church of La Vega rises very picturesquely14 above a range of hills covered with thick vegetation. Scattered15 houses surrounded with date-trees seem to denote the comfort of their inhabitants. A chain of low mountains separates the little river Guayra from the valley of La Pascua* (so celebrated16 in the history of the country), and from the ancient gold-mines of Baruta and Oripoto. Ascending17 in the direction of Carapa, we enjoy once more the sight of the Silla, which appears like an immense dome18 with a cliff on the side next the sea. This rounded summit, and the ridge19 of Galipano crenated like a wall, are the only objects which in this basin of gneiss and mica20-slate21 impress a peculiar character on the landscape. The other mountains have a uniform and monotonous23 aspect.
[* Valley of Cortes, or Easter Valley, so called because Diego de Losada, after having defeated the Teques Indians, and their cacique Guaycaypuro, in the mountains of San Pedro, spent the Easter there in 1567, before entering the valley of San Francisco. In the latter place he founded the city of Caracas.]
A little before reaching the village of Antimano we observed on the right a very curious geological phenomenon. In hollowing the new road out of the rock, two large veins26 of gneiss were discovered in the mica-slate. They are nearly perpendicular27, intersecting all the mica-slate strata28, and are from six to eight toises thick. These veins contain not fragments, but balls or spheres of granular diabasis,* formed of concentric layers. These balls are composed of lamellar feldspar and hornblende closely commingled29. The feldspar approximates sometimes to vitreous feldspar when disseminated31 in very thin laminae in a mass of granular diabasis, decomposed32, and emitting a strong argillaceous smell. The diameter of the spheres is very unequal, sometimes four or eight inches, sometimes three or four feet; their nucleus33, which is more dense34, is without concentric layers, and of a very dark green hue35, inclining to black. I could not perceive any mica in them; but, what is very remarkable36, I found great quantities of disseminated garnets. These garnets are of a very fine red, and are found in the grunstein only. They are neither in the gneiss, which serves as a cement to the balls, nor in the mica-slate, which the veins traverse. The gneiss, the constituent37 parts of which are in a state of considerable disintegration38, contains large crystals of feldspar; and, though it forms the body of the vein25 in the mica-slate, it is itself traversed by threads of quartz39 two inches thick, and of very recent formation. The aspect of this phenomenon is very curious: it appears as if cannon-balls were embedded40 in a wall of rock. I also thought I recognized in these same regions, in the Montana de Avila, and at Cabo Blanco, east of La Guayra, a granular diabasis, mixed with a small quantity of quartz and pyrites, and destitute41 of garnets, not in veins, but in subordinate strata in the mica-slate. This position is unquestionably to be found in Europe in primitive42 mountains; but in general the granular diabasis is more frequently connected with the system of transition rocks, especially with a schist (ubergangs-thonschiefer) abounding43 in beds of Lydian stone strongly carburetted, of schistose jasper,* (Kieselschiefer.) ampelites,* (Alaunschiefer.) and black limestone44.
[* Ur-grunstein. I remember having seen similar balls filling a vein in transition-slate, near the castle of Schauenstein in the margravate of Bayreuth. I sent several balls from Antimano to the collection of the king of Spain at Madrid.]
Near Antimano all the orchards45 were full of peach-trees loaded with blossom. This village, the Valle, and the banks of the Macarao, furnish great abundance of peaches, quinces, and other European fruits for the market of Caracas. Between Antimano and Ajuntas we crossed the Rio Guayra seventeen times. The road is very fatiguing46; yet, instead of making a new one, it would perhaps be better to change the bed of the river, which loses a great quantity of water by the combined effects of filtration and evaporation47. Each sinuosity forms a marsh48 more or less extensive. This loss of water is to be regretted in a province, nearly all the cultivated portions of which are extremely dry. The rains are much less frequent and less violent in this place than in the interior of New Andalusia, at Cumanacoa, and on the banks of the Guarapiche. Many of the mountains of Caracas enter the region of the clouds; but the strata of primitive rocks dip at an angle of 70 or 80°, and generally to northwest, so that the waters are either lost in the interior of the earth, or gush49 out in copious50 springs not southward but northward51 of the mountains of the coast of Niguatar, Avila, and Mariara. The rising of the gneiss and mica-slate strata to the south appears to me to explain in a considerable degree the extreme humidity of the coast. In the interior of the province we meet with portions of land, two or three leagues square, in which there are no springs; consequently sugar-cane52, indigo53, and coffee, grow only in places where running waters can be made to supply artificial irrigation during very dry weather. The early colonists54 imprudently destroyed the forests. Evaporation is enormous on a stony55 soil surrounded with rocks, which radiate heat on every side. The mountains of the coast, like a wall, extending east and west from Cape22 Codera toward Point Tucacas, prevent the humid air of the shore (that is to say, those inferior strata of the atmosphere resting immediately on the sea, and dissolving the largest proportion of water) from penetrating57 to the islands. There are few openings, few ravines, which, like those of Catia or of Tipe, lead from the coast to the high longitudinal valleys, and there is no bed of a great river, no gulf58 allowing the sea to flow inland, spreading moisture by abundant evaporation. In the eighth and tenth degrees of latitude, in regions where the clouds do not, as it were, skim the surface of the soil, many trees are stripped of their leaves in the months of January and February; not by the sinking of the temperature as in Europe, but because the air at this period, the most distant from the rainy season, nearly attains60 its maximum of dryness. Only those plants which have very tough and glossy61 leaves resist this absence of humidity. Beneath the fine sky of the tropics the traveller is struck with the almost hibernal aspect of the country; but the freshest verdure again appears when he reaches the banks of the Orinoco, where another climate prevails; and the great forests preserve by their shade a certain quantity of moisture in the soil, by sheltering it from the devouring62 heat of the sun.
Beyond the small village of Antimano the valley becomes much narrower. The river is bordered with Lata, a fine gramineous plant with distich leaves, which sometimes reaches the height of thirty feet.* Every hut is surrounded with enormous trees of persea,* at the foot of which the aristolochiae, paullinia, and other creepers vegetate63. The neighbouring mountains, covered with forests, seem to spread humidity over the western extremity64 of the valley of Caracas. We passed the night before our arrival at Las Ajuntas at a sugar-cane plantation65. A square house (the hacienda or farm of Don Fernando Key–Munoz) contained nearly eighty negroes; they were lying on skins of oxen spread upon the ground. In each apartment of the house were four slaves: it looked like a barrack. A dozen fires were burning in the farm-yard, where people were employed in dressing66 food, and the noisy mirth of the blacks almost prevented us from sleeping. The clouds hindered me from observing the stars; the moon appeared only at intervals68. The aspect of the landscape was dull and uniform, and all the surrounding hills were covered with aloes. Workmen were employed at a small canal, intended for conveying the waters of the Rio San Pedro to the farm, at a height of more than seventy feet. According to a barometric69 calculation, the site of the hacienda is only fifty toises above the bed of the Rio Guayra at La Noria, near Caracas.
[* G. saccharoides.]
[* Laurus persea (alligator pear).]
The soil of these countries is found to be but little favourable70 to the cultivation71 of the coffee-tree, which in general is less productive in the valley of Caracas than was imagined when the first plantations72 were made near Chacao. The finest coffee-plantations are now found in the savannah of Ocumare, near Salamanca, and at Rincon, in the mountainous countries of Los Mariches, San Antonio Hatillo, and Los Budares. The coffee of the three last mentioned places, situated73 eastward74 of Caracas, is of a superior quality; but the trees bear a smaller quantity, which is attributed to the height of the spot and the coolness of the climate. The greater plantations of the province of Venezuela (as Aguacates, near Valencia and Rincon) yield in good years a produce of three thousand quintals.
The extreme predilection75 entertained in this province for the culture of the coffee-tree is partly founded on the circumstance that the berry can be preserved during a great number of years; whereas, notwithstanding every possible care, cacao spoils in the warehouses76 after ten or twelve months. During the long dissensions of the European powers, at a time when Spain was too weak to protect the commerce of her colonies, industry was directed in preference to productions of which the sale was less urgent, and could await the chances of political and commercial events. I remarked that in the coffee-plantations the nurseries are formed not so much by collecting together young plants, accidentally rising under trees which have yielded a crop, as by exposing the seeds of coffee to germination77 during five days, in heaps, between plantain leaves. These seeds are taken out of the pulp78, but yet retaining a part of it adherent79 to them. When the seed has germinated80 it is sown, and it produces plants capable of bearing the heat of the sun better than those which spring up in the shade in coffee-plantations. In this country five thousand three hundred coffee-trees are generally planted in a fanega of ground, amounting to five thousand four hundred and seventy-six square toises. This land, if it be capable of artificial irrigation, costs five hundred piastres in the northern part of the province. The coffee-tree flowers only in the second year, and its flowering lasts only twenty-four hours. At this time the shrub81 has a charming appearance; and, when seen from afar, it appears covered with snow. The produce of the third year becomes very abundant. In plantations well weeded and watered, and recently cultivated, trees will bear sixteen, eighteen, and even twenty pounds of coffee. In general, however, more than a pound and a half or two pounds cannot be expected from each plant; and even this is superior to the mean produce of the West India Islands. The coffee trees suffer much from rain at the time of flowering, as well as from the want of water for artificial irrigation, and also from a parasitic82 plant, a new species of loranthus, which clings to the branches. When, in plantations of eighty or a hundred thousand shrubs83, we consider the immense quantity of organic matter contained in the pulpy84 berry of the coffee-tree, we may be astonished that no attempts have been made to extract a spirituous liquor from them.*
[* The berries heaped together produce a vinous fermentation, during which a very pleasant alcoholic86 smell is emitted. Placing, at Caracas, the ripe fruit of the coffee-tree under an inverted87 jar, quite filled with water, and exposed to the rays of the sun, I remarked that no extrication88 of gas took place in the first twenty-four hours. After thirty-six hours the berries became brown, and yielded gas. A thermometer, enclosed in the jar in contact with the fruit, kept at night 4 or 5° higher than the external air. In the space of eighty-seven hours, sixty berries, under various jars, yielded me from thirty-eight to forty cubic inches of a gas, which underwent no sensible diminution89 with nitrous gas. Though a great quantity of carbonic acid had been absorbed by the water as it was produced, I still found 0.78 in the forty inches. The remainder, or 0.22, was nitrogen. The carbonic acid had not been formed by the absorption of the atmospheric90 oxygen. That which is evolved from the berries of the coffee-tree slightly moistened, and placed in a phial with a glass stopple filled with air, contains alcohol in suspension; like the foul91 air which is formed in our cellars during the fermentation of must. On agitating92 the gas in contact with water, the latter acquires a decidedly alcoholic flavour. How many substances are perhaps contained in a state of suspension in those mixtures of carbonic acid and hydrogen, which are called deleterious miasmata, and which rise everywhere within the tropics, in marshy93 grounds, on the sea-shore, and in forests where the soil is strewed94 with dead leaves, rotten fruits, and putrefying insects.]
If the troubles of St. Domingo, the temporary rise in the price of colonial produce, and the emigration of French planters, were the first causes of the establishment of coffee plantations on the continent of America, in the island of Cuba, and in Jamaica; their produce has far more than compensated95 the deficiency of the exportation from the French West India Islands. This produce has augmented96 in proportion to the population, the change of customs, and the increasing luxury of the nations of Europe. The island of St. Domingo exported, in 1700, at the time of Necker’s administration, nearly seventy-six million pounds of coffee.*
[* French pounds, containing 9216 grains. 112 English pounds = 105 French pounds; and 160 Spanish pounds = 93 French pounds. The island of St. Domingo was at that time, it must be remembered, a French colony.]
Tea could be cultivated as well as coffee in the mountainous parts of the provinces of Caracas and Cumana. Every climate is there found rising in stages one above another; and this new culture would succeed there as well as in the southern hemisphere, where the government of Brazil, protecting at the same time industry and religious toleration, suffered at once the introduction of Chinese tea and of the dogmas of Fo. It is not yet a century since the first coffee-trees were planted at Surinam and in the West India Islands, and already the produce of America amounts to fifteen millions of piastres, reckoning the quintal of coffee at fourteen piastres only.
On the eighth of February we set out at sunrise, to cross the Higuerote, a group of lofty mountains, separating the two longitudinal valleys of Caracas and Aragua. After passing, near Las Ajuntas, the junction of the two small rivers San Pedro and Macarao, which form the Rio Guayra, we ascended98 a steep hill to the table-land of La Buenavista, where we saw a few lonely houses. The view extends on the north-west to the city of Caracas, and on the south to the village of Los Teques. The country has a very wild aspect, and is thickly wooded. We had now gradually lost the plants of the valley of Caracas.* We were eight hundred and thirty-five toises above the level of the ocean, which is almost the height of Popayan; but the mean temperature of this place is probably only 17 or 18°. The road over these mountains is much frequented; we met continually long files of mules99 and oxen; it is the great road leading from the capital to La Victoria, and the valleys of Aragua. This road is cut out of a talcose gneiss* in a state of decomposition100. A clayey soil mixed with spangles of mica covered the rock, to the depth of three feet. Travellers suffer from the dust in winter, while in the rainy season the place is changed into a slough101. On descending the table-land of Buenavista, about fifty toises to the south-east, an abundant spring, gushing102 from the gneiss, forms several cascades103 surrounded with thick vegetation. The path leading to the spring is so steep that we could touch with our hands the tops of the arborescent ferns, the trunks of which reach a height of more than twenty-five feet. The surrounding rocks are covered with jungermannias and hypnoid mosses104. The torrent105, formed by the spring, and shaded with heliconias, uncovers, as it falls, the roots of the plumerias,* cupeys,* browneas, and Ficus gigantea. This humid spot, though infested106 by serpents, presents a rich harvest to the botanist107. The Brownea, which the inhabitants call rosa del monte, or palo de cruz, bears four or five hundred purple flowers together in one thyrsus; each flower has invariably eleven stamina108, and this majestic109 plant, the trunk of which grows to the height of fifty or sixty feet, is becoming rare, because its wood yields a highly valued charcoal110. The soil is covered with pines (ananas), hemimeris, polygala, and melastomas. A climbing gramen* with its light festoons unites trees, the presence of which attests111 the coolness of the climate of these mountains. Such are the Aralia capitata,* the Vismia caparosa, and the Clethra fagifolia. Among these plants, peculiar to the fine region of the arborescent ferns,* some palm-trees rise in the openings, and some scattered groups of guarumo, or cecropia with silvery leaves. The trunks of the latter are not very thick, and are of a black colour towards the summit, as if burnt by the oxygen of the atmosphere. We are surprised to find so noble a tree, which has the port of the theophrasta and the palm-tree, bearing generally only eight or ten terminal leaves. The ants, which inhabit the trunk of the guarumo, or jarumo, and destroy its interior cells, seem to impede112 its growth. We had already made one herborization in the temperate113 mountains of the Higuerote in the month of December, accompanying the capitan-general, Senor de Guevara, in an excursion with the intendant of the province to the Valles de Aragua. M. Bonpland then found in the thickest part of the forest some plants of aguatire, the wood of which, celebrated for its fine red colour, will probably one day become an article of exportation to Europe. It is the Sickingia erythroxylon described by Bredemeyer and Willdenouw.
[* The Flora114 of Caracas is characterized chiefly by the following plants, which grow between the heights of four hundred and six hundred toises. Cipura martinicensis, Panicum mieranthum, Parthenium hysterophorus, Vernonia odoratissima, (Pevetera, with flowers having a delicious odour of heliotropium), Tagetes caracasana, T. scoparia of Lagasca (introduced by M. Bonpland into the gardens of Spain), Croton hispidus, Smilax scabriusculus, Limnocharis Humboldti, Rich., Equisetum ramosissimum, Heteranthera alismoides, Glycine punctata, Hyptis Plumeri, Pavonia cancellata, Cav., Spermacoce rigida, Crotalaria acutifolia, Polygala nemorosa, Stachytarpheta mutabilis, Cardiospermum ulmaceum, Amaranthus caracasanus, Elephantopus strigosus, Hydrolea mollis, Alternanthera caracasana, Eupatorium amydalinum, Elytraria fasciculata, Salvia fimbriata, Angelonia salicaria, Heliotropium strictum, Convolvulus batarilla, Rubus jamaicensis, Datura arborea, Dalea enneaphylla, Buchnera rosea, Salix Humboldtiana, Willd., Theophrasta longifolia, Tournefortia caracasana, Inga cinerea, I. ligustrina, I. sapindioides, I. fastuosa, Schwenkia patens, Erythrina mitis. The most agreeable places for herborizing near Caracas are the ravines of Tacagua, Tipe, Cotecita, Catoche, Anauco, and Chacaito.]
[* The direction of the strata of gneiss varies; it is either hor. 3.4, dipping to the north-west or hor. 8.2, dipping to the south-east.]
[* The red jasmine-tree, frangipanier of the French West India Islands. The plumeria, so common in the gardens of the Indians, has been very seldom found in a wild state. It is mixed here with the Piper flagellare, the spadix of which sometimes reaches three feet long. With the new kind of fig-tree (which we have called Ficus gigantea, because it frequently attains the height of a hundred feet), we find in the mountains of Buenavista and of Los Teques, the Ficus nymphaeifolia of the garden of Schonbrunn, introduced into our hot-houses by M. Bredemeyer. I am certain of the identity of the species found in the same places; but I doubt really whether it be really the F. nymphaeifolia of Linnaeus, which is supposed to be a native of the East Indies.]
[* In the experiments I made at Caracas, on the air which circulates in plants, I was struck with the fine appearance presented by the petioles and leaves of the Clusia rosea, when cut open under water, and exposed to the rays of the sun. Each trachea gives out a current of gas, purer by 0.08 than atmospheric air. The phenomenon ceases the moment the apparatus115 is placed in the shade. There is only a very slight disengagement of air at the two surfaces of the leaves of the clusia exposed to the sun without being cut open. The gas enclosed in the capsules of the Cardiospermum vesicarium appeared to me to contain the same proportion of oxygen as the atmosphere, while that contained between the knots, in the hollow of the stalk, is generally less pure, containing only from 0.12 to 0.15 of oxygen. It is necessary to distinguish between the air circulating in the tracheae, and that which is stagnant116 in the great cavities of the stems and pericarps.]
[* Carice. See Chapter 6.]
[* Candelero. We found it also at La Cumbre, at a height of 700 toises.]
[* Called by the inhabitants of the country Region de los helechos.]
Descending the woody mountain of the Higuerote to the south-west, we reached the small village of San Pedro, situated in a basin where several valleys meet, and almost three hundred toises lower than the table-land of Buenavista. Plantain-trees, potatoes,* and coffee are cultivated together on this spot. The village is very small, and the church not yet finished. We met at an inn (pulperia) several European Spaniards employed at the government tobacco farm. Their dissatisfaction formed a strange contrast to our feelings. They were fatigued117 with their journey, and they vented67 their displeasure in complaints and maledictions on the wretched country, or to use their own phrase, estas tierras infelices, in which they were doomed118 to live. We, on the other hand, were enchanted119 with the wild scenery, the fertility of the soil, and the mildness of the climate. Near San Pedro, the talcose gneiss of Buenavista passes into a mica-slate filled with garnets, and containing subordinate beds of serpentine120. Something analogous121 to this is met with at Zoblitz in Saxony. The serpentine, which is very pure and of a fine green, varied122 with spots of a lighter123 tint124, often appears only superimposed on the mica-slate. I found in it a few garnets, but no metaloid diallage.
[* Solanum tuberosum.]
The valley of San Pedro, through which flows the river of the same name, separates two great masses of mountains, the Higuerote and Las Cocuyzas. We ascended westward in the direction of the small farms of Las Lagunetos and Garavatos. These are solitary125 houses, which serve as inns, and where the mule-drivers obtain their favourite beverage126, the guarapo, or fermented127 juice of the sugar-cane: intoxication128 is very common among the Indians who frequent this road. Near Garavatos there is a mica-slate rock of singular form; it is a ridge, or steep wall, crowned by a tower. We opened the barometer at the highest point of the mountain Las Cocuyzas,* and found ourselves almost at the same elevation129 as on the table-land of Buenavista, which is scarcely ten toises higher.
[* Absolute height 845 toises.]
The prospect130 at Las Lagunetas is extensive, but rather uniform. This mountainous and uncultivated tract85 of ground between the sources of the Guayra and the Tuy is more than twenty-five square leagues in extent. We there found only one miserable131 village, that of Los Teques, south-east of San Pedro. The soil is as it were furrowed132 by a multitude of valleys, the smallest of which, parallel with each other, terminate at right angles in the largest valleys. The back of the mountains presents an aspect as monotonous as the ravines; it has no pyramidal forms, no ridges133, no steep declivities. I am inclined to think that the undulation of this ground, which is for the most part very gentle, is less owing to the nature of the rocks, (to the decomposition of the gneiss for instance), than to the long presence of the water and the action of currents. The limestone mountains of Cumana present the same phenomenon north of Tumiriquiri.
From Las Lagunetas we descended134 into the valley of the Rio Tuy. This western slope of the mountains of Los Teques bears the name of Las Cocuyzas, and it is covered with two plants with agave leaves; the maguey of Cocuyza, and the maquey of Cocuy. The latter belongs to the genus Yucca.* Its sweet and fermented juice yields a spirit by distillation135; and I have seen the young leaves of this plant eaten. The fibres of the full-grown leaves furnish cords of extraordinary strength.* Leaving the mountains of the Higuerote and Los Teques, we entered a highly cultivated country, covered with hamlets and villages; several of which would in Europe be called towns. From east to west, on a line of twelve leagues in extent, we passed La Victoria, San Mateo, Turmero, and Maracay, containing together more than 28, 000 inhabitants. The plains of the Tuy may be considered as the eastern extremity of the valleys of Aragua, extending from Guigne, on the borders of the lake of Valencia, as far as the foot of Las Cocuyzas. A barometrical136 measurement gave me 295 toises for the absolute height of the Valle del Tuy, near the farm of Manterola, and 222 toises for that of the surface of the lake. The Rio Tuy, flowing from the mountains of Las Cocuyzas, runs first towards the west, then turning to the south and to the east, it takes its course along the high savannahs of Ocumare, receives the waters of the valley of Caracas, and reaches the sea near cape Codera. It is the small portion of its basin in the westward direction which, geologically speaking, would seem to belong to the valley of Aragua, if the hills of calcareous tufa, breaking the continuity of these valleys between Consejo and La Victoria, did not deserve some consideration. We shall here again remind the reader that the group of the mountains of Los Teques, eight hundred and fifty toises high, separates two longitudinal valleys, formed in gneiss, granite137, and mica-slate. The most eastern of these valleys, containing the capital of Caracas, is 200 toises higher than the western valley, which may be considered as the centre of agricultural industry.
[* Yucca acaulis, Humb.]
[* At the clock of the cathedral of Caracas, a cord of maguey, half an inch in diameter, sustained for fifteen years a weight of 350 pounds.]
Having been for a long time accustomed to a moderate temperature, we found the plains of the Tuy extremely hot, although the thermometer kept, in the day-time, between eleven in the morning and five in the afternoon, at only 23 or 24°. The nights were delightfully138 cool, the temperature falling as low as 17.5°. As the heat gradually abated139, the air became more and more fragrant140 with the odour of flowers. We remarked above all the delicious perfume of the Lirio hermoso,* a new species of pancratium, of which the flower, eight or nine inches long, adorns141 the banks of the Rio Tuy. We spent two very agreeable days at the plantation of Don Jose de Manterola, who in his youth had accompanied the Spanish embassy to Russia. The farm is a fine plantation of sugar-canes142; and the ground is as smooth as the bottom of a drained lake. The Rio Tuy winds through districts covered with plantains, and a little wood of Hura crepitans, Erythrina corallodendron, and fig-trees with nymphaea leaves. The bed of the river is formed of pebbles143 of quartz. I never met with more agreeable bathing than in the Tuy. The water, as clear as crystal, preserves even during the day a temperature of 18.6°; a considerable coolness for these climates, and for a height of three hundred toises; but the sources of the river are in the surrounding mountains. The house of the proprietor144, situated on a hillock, of fifteen or twenty toises of elevation, is surrounded by the huts of the negroes. Those who are married provide food for themselves; and here, as everywhere else in the valleys of Aragua, a small spot of ground is allotted145 to them to cultivate. They labour on that ground on Saturdays and Sundays, the only days in the week on which they are free. They keep poultry147, and sometimes even a pig. Their masters boast of their happiness, as in the north of Europe the great landholders love to descant148 upon the ease enjoyed by peasants who are attached to the glebe. On the day of our arrival we saw three fugitive149 negroes brought back; they were slaves newly purchased. I dreaded150 having to witness one of those punishments which, wherever slavery prevails, destroys all the charm of a country life. Happily these blacks were treated with humanity.
[* Pancratium undulatum.]
In this plantation, as in all those of the province of Venezuela, three species of sugar-cane can be distinguished151 even at a distance by the colour of their leaves; the old Creole sugar-cane, the Otaheite cane, and the Batavia cane. The first has a deep-green leaf, the stem not very thick, and the knots rather near together. This sugar-cane was the first introduced from India into Sicily, the Canary Islands, and West Indies. The second is of a lighter green; and its stem is higher, thicker, and more succulent. The whole plant exhibits a more luxuriant vegetation. We owe this plant to the voyages of Bougainville, Cook, and Bligh. Bougainville carried it to the Mauritius, whence it passed to Cayenne, Martinique, and, since 1792, to the rest of the West India Islands. The sugar-cane of Otaheite, called by the people of that island To, is one of the most important acquisitions for which colonial agriculture is indebted to the travels of naturalists152. It yields not only one-third more juice than the creolian cane on the same space of ground; but from the thickness of its stem, and the tenacity153 of its ligneous154 fibres, it furnishes much more fuel. This last advantage is important in the West Indies, where the destruction of the forests has long obliged the planters to use canes deprived of juice, to keep up the fire under the boilers155. But for the knowledge of this new plant, together with the progress of agriculture on the continent of Spanish America, and the introduction of the East India and Java sugar, the prices of colonial produce in Europe would have been much more sensibly affected156 by the revolutions of St. Domingo, and the destruction of the great sugar plantations of that island. The Otaheite sugar-cane was carried from the island of Trinidad to Caracas, under the name of Cana solera, and it passed from Caracas to Cucuta and San Gil in the kingdom of New Grenada. In our days its cultivation during twenty-five years has almost entirely157 removed the apprehension158 at first entertained, that being transplanted to America, the cane would by degrees degenerate159, and become as slender as the creole cane. The third species, the violet sugar-cane, called Cana de Batavia, or de Guinea, is certainly indigenous160 in the island of Java, where it is cultivated in preference in the districts of Japara and Pasuruan.* Its foliage161 is purple and very broad; and this cane is preferred in the province of Caracas for rum. The tablones, or grounds planted with sugar-canes, are divided by hedges of a colossal162 gramen; the lata, or gynerium, with distich leaves. At the Tuy, men were employed in finishing a dyke163, to form a canal of irrigation. This enterprise had cost the proprietor seven thousand piastres for the expense of labour, and four thousand piastres for the costs of lawsuits164 in which he had become engaged with his neighbours. While the lawyers were disputing about a canal of which only one-half was finished, Don Jose de Manterola began to doubt even of the possibility of carrying the plan into execution. I took the level of the ground with a lunette d’epreuve, on an artificial horizon, and found, that the dam had been constructed eight feet too low. What sums of money have I seen expended166 uselessly in the Spanish colonies, for undertakings167 founded on erroneous levelling!
[* Raffles168 History of Java tome 1 page 124.]
The valley of the Tuy has its ‘gold mine,’ like almost every part of America inhabited by whites, and backed by primitive mountains. I was assured, that in 1780, foreign gold-gatherers had been engaged in picking up grains of that metal, and had established a place for washing the sand in the Quebrada del Oro. An overseer of a neighbouring plantation had followed these indications; and after his death, a waistcoat with gold buttons being found among his clothes, this gold, according to the logic24 of the people here, could only have proceeded from a vein, which the falling in of the earth had rendered invisible. In vain I objected, that I could not, by the mere169 view of the soil, without digging a large trench170 in the direction of the vein, judge of the existence of the mine; I was compelled to yield to the desire of my hosts. For twenty years past the overseer’s waistcoat had been the subject of conversation in the country. Gold extracted from the bosom171 of the earth is far more alluring172 in the eyes of the vulgar, than that which is the produce of agricultural industry, favoured by the fertility of the soil, and the mildness of the climate.
North-west of the Hacienda del Tuy, in the northern range of the chain of the coast, we find a deep ravine, called the Quebrada Seca, because the torrent, by which it was formed, loses its waters through the crevices173 of the rock, before it reaches the extremity of the ravine. The whole of this mountainous country is covered with thick vegetation. We there found the same verdure as had charmed us by its freshness in the mountains of Buenavista and Las Lagunetas, wherever the ground rises as high as the region of the clouds, and where the vapours of the sea have free access. In the plains, on the contrary, many trees are stripped of a part of their leaves during the winter; and when we descend3 into the valley of the Tuy, we are struck with the almost hibernal aspect of the country. The dryness of the air is such that the hygrometer of Deluc keeps day and night between 36 and 40°. At a distance from the river scarcely any huras or piper-trees extend their foliage over thickets174 destitute of verdure. This seems owing to the dryness of the air, which attains its maximum in the month of February; and not, as the European planters assert, “to the seasons of Spain, of which the empire extends as far as the torrid zone.” It is only plants transported from one hemisphere to the other, which, in their organic functions, in the development of their leaves and flowers, still retain their affinity175 to a distant climate: faithful to their habits, they follow for a long time the periodical changes of their native hemisphere. In the province of Venezuela the trees stripped of their foliage begin to renew their leaves nearly a month before the rainy season. It is probable, that at this period the electrical equilibrium176 of the air is already disturbed, and the atmosphere, although not yet clouded, becomes gradually more humid. The azure177 of the sky is paler, and the elevated regions are loaded with light vapours, uniformly diffused178. This season may be considered as the awakening179 of nature; it is a spring which, according to the received language of the Spanish colonies, proclaims the beginning of winter, and succeeds to the heats of summer.*
[* That part of the year most abundant in rain is called winter; so that in Terra Firma, the season which begins by the winter solstice, is designated by the name of summer; and it is usual to hear, that it is winter on the mountains, at the time when summer prevails in the neighbouring plains.]
Indigo was formerly180 cultivated in the Quebrada Seca; but as the soil covered with vegetation cannot there concentrate so much heat as the plains and the bottom of the Tuy valley receive and radiate, the cultivation of coffee has been substituted in its stead. As we advanced in the ravine we found the moisture increase. Near the Hato, at the northern extremity of the Quebrada, a torrent rolls down over sloping beds of gneiss. An aqueduct was being formed there to convey the water to the plain. Without irrigation, agriculture makes no progress in these climates. A tree of monstrous181 size fixed182 our attention.* It lay on the slope of the mountain, above the house of the Hato. On the least dislodgment of the earth, its fall would have crushed the habitation which it shaded: it had therefore been burnt near its foot, and cut down in such a manner, that it fell between some enormous fig-trees, which prevented it from rolling into the ravine. We measured the fallen tree; and though its summit had been burnt, the length of its trunk was still one hundred and fifty-four feet.* It was eight feet in diameter near the roots, and four feet two inches at the upper extremity.
[* Hura crepitans.]
[* French measure, nearly fifty metres.]
Our guides, less anxious than ourselves to measure the bulk of trees, continually pressed us to proceed onward183 and seek the ‘gold mine.’ This part of the ravine is little frequented, and is not uninteresting. We made the following observations on the geological constitution of the soil. At the entrance of the Quebrada Seca we remarked great masses of primitive saccharoidal limestone, tolerably fine grained, of a bluish tint, and traversed by veins of calcareous spar of dazzling whiteness. These calcareous masses must not be confounded with the very recent depositions184 of tufa, or carbonate of lime, which fill the plains of the Tuy; they form beds of mica-slate, passing into talc-slate.* The primitive limestone often simply covers this latter rock in concordant stratification. Very near the Hato the talcose slate becomes entirely white, and contains small layers of soft and unctuous185 graphic186 ampelite.* Some pieces, destitute of veins of quartz, are real granular plumbago, which might be of use in the arts. The aspect of the rock is very singular in those places where thin plates of black ampelite alternate with thin, sinuous187, and satiny plates of a talcose slate as white as snow. It would seem as if the carbon and iron, which in other places colour the primitive rocks, are here concentrated in the subordinate strata.
[* Talkschiefer of Werner, without garnets or serpentine; not eurite or weisstein. It is in the mountains of Buenavista that the gneiss manifests a tendency to pass into eurite.]
[* Zeichenschiefer.]
Turning westward we reached at length the ravine of gold (Quebrada del Oro). On examining the slope of a hill, we could hardly recognize the vestige188 of a vein of quartz. The falling of the earth caused by the rains had changed the surface of the ground, and rendered it impossible to make any observation. Great trees were growing in the places where the gold-washers had worked twenty years before. It is probable that the mica-slate contains here, as near Goldcronach in Franconia, and in Salzburgh, auriferous veins; but how is it possible to judge whether they be worth the expense of being wrought189, or whether the ore is only in nodules, and in the less abundance in proportion as it is rich? We made a long herborization in a thick forest, extending beyond the Hato, and abounding in cedrelas, browneas, and fig-trees with nymphaea leaves. The trunks of these last are covered with very odoriferous plants of vanilla190, which in general flower only in the month of April. We were here again struck with those ligneous excrescences, which in the form of ridges, or ribs191, augment97 to the height of twenty feet above the ground, the thickness of the trunk of the fig-trees of America. I found trees twenty-two feet and a half in diameter near the roots. These ligneous ridges sometimes separate from the trunk at a height of eight feet, and are transformed into cylindrical192 roots two feet thick. The tree looks as if it were supported by buttresses193. This scaffolding however does not penetrate194 very deep into the earth. The lateral195 roots wind at the surface of the ground, and if at twenty feet distance from the trunk they are cut with a hatchet196, we see gushing out the milky197 juice of the fig-tree, which, when deprived of the vital influence of the organs of the tree, is altered and coagulates. What a wonderful combination of cells and vessels198 exist in these vegetable masses, in these gigantic trees of the torrid zone, which without interruption, perhaps during the space of a thousand years, prepare nutritious199 fluids, raise them to the height of one hundred and eighty feet, convey them down again to the ground, and conceal200, beneath a rough and hard bark, under inanimate layers of ligneous matter, all the movements of organic life!
I availed myself of the clearness of the nights, to observe at the plantation of Tuy two emersions of the first and third satellites of Jupiter. These two observations gave, according to the tables of Delambre, longitude201 4 hours 39 minutes 14 seconds; and by the chronometer202 I found 4 hours 39 minutes 10 seconds. During my stay in the valleys of the Tuy and Aragua the zodiacal light appeared almost every night with extraordinary brilliancy. I had perceived it for the first time between the tropics at Caracas, on the 18th of January, after seven in the evening. The point of the pyramid was at the height of 53°. The light totally disappeared at 9 hours 35 minutes (apparent time), nearly 3 hours 50 minutes after sunset, without any diminution in the serenity203 of the sky. La Caille, in his voyage to Rio Janeiro and the Cape, was struck with the beautiful appearance displayed by the zodiacal light within the tropics, not so much on account of its less inclined position, as of the greater transparency of the air.* It may appear singular, that Childrey and Dominic Cassini, navigators who were well acquainted with the seas of the two Indies, did not at a much earlier period direct the attention of scientific Europe to this light, and its regular form and progress. Until the middle of the eighteenth century mariners204 were little interested by anything not having immediate56 relation to the course of a ship, and the demands of navigation.
[* The great serenity of the air caused this phenomenon to be remarked, in 1668, in the arid205 plains of Persia.]
However brilliant the zodiacal light in the dry valley of Tuy, I have observed it more beautiful still at the back of the Cordilleras of Mexico, on the banks of the lake of Tezcuco, eleven hundred and sixty toises above the surface of the ocean. In the month of January, 1804, the light rose sometimes to more than 60° above the horizon. The Milky Way appeared to grow pale compared with the brilliancy of the zodiacal light; and if small, bluish, scattered clouds were accumulated toward the west, it seemed as if the moon were about to rise.
I must here relate another very singular fact. On the 18th of January, and the 15th of February, 1800, the intensity206 of the zodiacal light changed in a very perceptible manner, at intervals of two or three minutes. Sometimes it was very faint, at others it surpassed the brilliancy of the Milky Way in Sagittarius. The changes took place in the whole pyramid, especially toward the interior, far from the edges. During these variations of the zodiacal light, the hygrometer indicated considerable dryness. The stars of the fourth and fifth magnitude appeared constantly to the naked eye with the same degree of light. No stream of vapour was visible: nothing seemed to alter the transparency of the atmosphere. In other years I saw the zodiacal light augment in the southern hemisphere half an hour before its disappearance207. Cassini admitted “that the zodiacal light was feebler in certain years, and then returned to its former brilliancy.” He thought that these slow changes were connected with “the same emanations which render the appearance of spots and faculae periodical on the solar disk.” But this excellent observer does not mention those changes of intensity in the zodiacal light which I have several times remarked within the tropics, in the space of a few minutes. Mairan asserts, that in France it is common enough to see the zodiacal light, in the months of February and March, mingling208 with a kind of Aurora209 Borealis, which he calls ‘undecided,’ and the nebulous matter of which spreads itself all around the horizon, or appears toward the west. I very much doubt, whether, in the observations I have been describing, there was any mixture of these two species of light. The variations in intensity took place at considerable altitudes; the light was white, and not coloured; steady, and not undulating. Besides, the Aurora Borealis is so seldom visible within the tropics, that during five years, though almost constantly sleeping in the open air, and observing the heavens with unremitting attention, I never perceived the least traces of that phenomenon.
I am rather inclined to think that the variations of the zodiacal light are not all appearances dependent on certain modifications210 in the state of our atmosphere. Sometimes, during nights equally clear, I sought in vain for the zodiacal light, when, on the previous night, it had appeared with the greatest brilliancy. Must we admit that emanations which reflect white light, and seem to have some analogy with the tails of comets, are less abundant at certain periods? Researches on the zodiacal light have acquired a new degree of interest since geometricians have taught us that we are ignorant of the real causes of this phenomenon. The illustrious author of “La Mecanique Celeste” has shown that the solar atmosphere cannot reach even the planet Mercury; and that it could not in any case display the lenticular form which has been attributed to the zodiacal light. We may also entertain the same doubts respecting the nature of this light, as with regard to that of the tails of comets. Is it in fact a reflected or a direct light?
We left the plantation of Manterola on the 11th of February, at sunrise. The road runs along the smiling banks of the Tuy; the morning was cool and humid, and the air seemed embalmed211 by the delicious odour of the Pancratium undulatum, and other large liliaceous plants. In our way to La Victoria, we passed the pretty village of Mamon or of Consejo, celebrated in the country for a miraculous212 image of the Virgin213. A little before we reached Mamon, we stopped at a farm belonging to the family of Monteras. A negress more than a hundred years old was seated before a small hut built of earth and reeds. Her age was known because she was a creole slave. She seemed still to enjoy very good health. “I keep her in the sun” (la tengo al sol), said her grandson; “the heat keeps her alive.” This appeared to us not a very agreeable mode of prolonging life, for the sun was darting214 his rays almost perpendicularly216. The brown-skinned nations, blacks well seasoned, and Indians, frequently attain59 a very advanced age in the torrid zone. A native of Peru named Hilario Pari died at the extraordinary age of one hundred and forty-three years, after having been ninety years married.
Don Francisco Montera and his brother, a well-informed young priest, accompanied us with the view of conducting us to their house at La Victoria. Almost all the families with whom we had lived in friendship at Caracas were assembled in the fine valleys of Aragua, and they vied with each other in their efforts to render our stay agreeable. Before we plunged217 into the forests of the Orinoco, we enjoyed once more all the advantages which advanced civilization affords.
The road from Mamon to La Victoria runs south and south-west. We soon lost sight of the river Tuy, which, turning eastward, forms an elbow at the foot of the high mountains of Guayraima. As we drew nearer to Victoria the ground became smoother; it seemed like the bottom of a lake, the waters of which had been drained off. We might have fancied ourselves in the valley of Hasli, in the canton of Berne. The neighbouring hills, only one hundred and forty toises in height, are composed of calcareous tufa; but their abrupt218 declivities project like promontories219 on the plain. Their form indicates the ancient shore of the lake. The eastern extremity of this valley is parched220 and uncultivated. No advantage has been derived221 from the ravines which water the neighbouring mountains; but fine cultivation is commencing in the proximity222 of the town. I say of the town, though in my time Victoria was considered only as a village (pueblo).
The environs of La Victoria present a very remarkable agricultural aspect. The height of the cultivated ground is from two hundred and seventy to three hundred toises above the level of the ocean, and yet we there find fields of corn mingled30 with plantations of sugar-cane, coffee, and plantains. Excepting the interior of the island of Cuba,* we scarcely find elsewhere in the equinoctial regions European corn cultivated in large quantities in so low a region. The fine fields of wheat in Mexico are between six hundred and twelve hundred toises of absolute elevation; and it is rare to see them descend to four hundred toises. We shall soon perceive that the produce of grain augments223 sensibly, from high latitudes224 towards the equator, with the mean temperature of the climate, in comparing spots of different elevations225. The success of agriculture depends on the dryness of the air; on the rains distributed through different seasons, or accumulated in one season; on winds blowing constantly from the east; or bringing the cold air of the north into very low latitudes, as in the gulf of Mexico; on mists, which for whole months diminish the intensity of the solar rays; in short, on a thousand local circumstances which have less influence on the mean temperature of the whole year than on the distribution of the same quantity of heat through the different parts of the year. It is a striking spectacle to see the grain of Europe cultivated from the equator as far as Lapland in the latitude of 69°, in regions where the mean heat is from 22 to -2°, in every place where the temperature of summer is above 9 or 10°. We know the minimum of heat requisite226 to ripen227 wheat, barley228, and oats; but we are less certain in respect to the maximum which these species of grain, accommodating as they are, can support. We are even ignorant of all the circumstances which favour the culture of corn within the tropics at very small heights. La Victoria and the neighbouring village of San Mateo yield an annual produce of four thousand quintals of wheat. It is sown in the month of December, and the harvest is reaped on the seventieth or seventy-fifth day. The grain is large, white, and abounding in gluten; its pellicle is thinner and not so hard as that of the wheat of the very cold table-lands of Mexico. An acre* near Victoria generally yields from three thousand to three thousand two hundred pounds weight of wheat. The average produce is consequently here, as at Buenos Ayres, three or four times as much as that of northern countries. Nearly sixteenfold of the quantity of seed is reaped; while, according to Lavoisier, the surface of France yields on an average only five or six for one, or from one thousand to twelve hundred pounds per acre. Notwithstanding this fecundity229 of the soil, and this happy influence of the climate, the culture of the sugar-cane is more productive in the valleys of Aragua than that of corn.
[* The district of Quatro Villas230.]
[* An arpent des eaux et forets, or legal acre of France, of which 1.95 = 1 hectare. It is about 1 1/4 acre English.]
La Victoria is traversed by the little river Calanchas, running, not into the Tuy, but into the Rio Aragua: it thence results that this fine country, producing at once sugar and corn, belongs to the basin of the lake of Valencia, to a system of interior rivers not communicating with the sea. The quarter of the town west of the Rio Calanchas is called la otra banda; it is the most commercial part; merchandize is everywhere exhibited, and ranges of shops form the streets. Two commercial roads pass through La Victoria, that of Valencia, or of Porto Cabello, and the road of Villa12 de Cura, or of the plains, called camino de los Llanos. We here find more whites in proportion than at Caracas. We visited at sunset the little hill of Calvary, where the view is extremely fine and extensive. We discover on the west the lovely valleys of Aragua, a vast space covered with gardens, cultivated fields, clumps231 of wild trees, farms, and hamlets. Turning south and south-east, we see, extending as far as the eye can reach, the lofty mountains of La Palma, Guayraima, Tiara, and Guiripa, which conceal the immense plains or steppes of Calabozo. This interior chain stretches westward along the lake of Valencia, towards the Villa de Cura, the Cuesta de Yusma, and the denticulated mountains of Guigne. It is very steep, and constantly covered with that light vapour which in hot climates gives a vivid blue tint to distant objects, and, far from concealing232 their outlines, marks them the more strongly. It is believed that among the mountains of the interior chain, that of Guayraima reaches an elevation of twelve hundred toises. I found in the night of the eleventh of February the latitude of La Victoria 10° 13′ 35″, the magnetic dip 40.8°, the intensity of the forces equal to 236 oscillations in ten minutes of time, and the variation of the needle 4.4° north-east.
We proceeded slowly on our way by the villages of San Mateo, Turmero, and Maracay, to the Hacienda de Cura, a fine plantation belonging to Count Tovar, where we arrived on the evening of the fourteenth of February. The valley, which gradually widens, is bordered with hills of calcareous tufa, called here tierra blanca. The scientific men of the country have made several attempts to calcine this earth, mistaking it for the porcelain233 earth proceeding234 from decomposed strata of feldspar. We stayed some hours with a very intelligent family, named Ustariz, at Concesion. Their house, which contains a collection of choice books, stands on an eminence235, and is surrounded by plantations of coffee and sugar-cane. A grove236 of balsam-trees (balsamo*) gives coolness and shade to this spot. It was gratifying to observe the great number of scattered houses in the valley inhabited by freedmen. In the Spanish colonies, the laws, the institutions, and the manners, are more favourable to the liberty of the negroes than in other European settlements.
[* Amyris elata.]
San Mateo, Turmero, and Maracay, are charming villages, where everything denotes the comfort of the inhabitants. We seemed to be transported to the most industrious237 districts of Catalonia. Near San Mateo we find the last fields of wheat, and the last mills with horizontal hydraulic238 wheels. A harvest of twenty for one was expected; and, as if that produce were but moderate, I was asked whether corn yielded more in Prussia and in Poland. By an error generally prevalent under the tropics, the produce of grain is supposed to degenerate in advancing towards the equator, and harvests are believed to be more abundant in northern climates. Since calculations have been made on the progress of agriculture in the different zones, and on the temperatures under the influence of which corn will flourish, it has been found that, beyond the latitude of 45°, the produce of wheat is nowhere so considerable as on the northern coasts of Africa, and on the table-lands of New Grenada, Peru, and Mexico. Without comparing the mean temperature of the whole year, but only the mean temperature of the season which embraces the corn cycle of vegetation, we find for three months of summer,* in the north of Europe, from 15 to 19°; in Barbary and in Egypt, from 27 to 29°; within the tropics, between fourteen and three hundred toises of height, from 14 to 25.5° of the centigrade thermometer.
[* The mean heat of the summers of Scotland in the environs of Edinburgh, (latitude 56°), is found again on the table-lands of New Grenada, so rich in wheat, at 1400 toises of elevation, and at 4° north latitude. On the other hand, we find the mean temperature of the valleys of Aragua, latitude 10° 13′, and of all the plains which are not very elevated in the torrid zone, in the summer temperature of Naples and Sicily, latitude 39 to 40°. These figures indicate the situation of the isotheric lines (lines of the same summer heat), and not that of the isothermal lines (those of equal annual temperature). Considering the quantity of heat received on the same spot of the globe during a whole year, the mean temperatures of the valleys of Aragua, and the table-lands of New Grenada, at 300 and 1400 toises of elevation, correspond to the mean temperatures of the coasts at 23 and 45° of latitude.]
The fine harvests of Egypt and of Algiers, as well as those of the valleys of Aragua and the interior of the island of Cuba, sufficiently239 prove that the augmentation of heat is not prejudicial to the harvest of wheat and other alimentary240 grain, unless it be attended with an excess of drought or moisture. To this circumstance no doubt we must attribute the apparent anomalies sometimes observed within the tropics, in the lower limit of corn. We are astonished to see, eastward of the Havannah, in the famous district of Quatro Villas, that this limit descends241 almost to the level of the ocean; whilst west of the Havannah, on the slope of the mountains of Mexico and Xalapa, at six hundred and seventy-seven toises of height, the luxuriance of vegetation is such, that wheat does not form ears. At the beginning of the Spanish conquest, the corn of Europe was cultivated with success in several regions now supposed to be too hot, or too damp, for this branch of agriculture. The Spaniards on their first removal to America were little accustomed to live on maize242. They still adhered to their European habits. They did not calculate whether corn would be less profitable than coffee or cotton. They tried seeds of every kind, making experiments the more boldly because their reasonings were less founded on false theories. The province of Carthagena, crossed by the chain of the mountains Maria and Guamoco, produced wheat till the sixteenth century. In the province of Caracas, this culture is of very ancient date in the mountainous lands of Tocuyo, Quibor, and Barquisimeto, which connect the littoral243 chain with the Sierra Nevada of Merida. Wheat is still successfully cultivated there, and the environs of the town of Tocuyo alone export annually244 more than eight thousand quintals of excellent flour. But, though the province of Caracas, in its vast extent, includes several spots very favourable to the cultivation of European corn, I believe that in general this branch of agriculture will never acquire any great importance there. The most temperate valleys are not sufficiently wide; they are not real table-lands; and their mean elevation above the level of the sea is not so considerable but that the inhabitants cannot fail to perceive that it is more their interest to establish plantations of coffee, than to cultivate corn. Flour now comes to Caracas either from Spain or from the United States.
The village of Turmero is four leagues distant from San Mateo. The road leads through plantations of sugar, indigo, cotton, and coffee. The regularity245 observable in the construction of the villages, reminded us that they all owe their origin to monks246 and missions. The streets are straight and parallel, crossing each other at right angles; and the church is invariably erected247 in the great square, situated in the centre of the village. The church of Turmero is a fine edifice248, but overloaded249 with architectural ornaments250. Since the missionaries251 have been replaced by vicars, the whites have mingled their habitations with those of the Indians. The latter are gradually disappearing as a separate race; that is to say, they are represented in the general statement of the population by the Mestizoes and the Zamboes, whose numbers daily increase. I still found, however, four thousand tributary252 Indians in the valleys of Aragua. Those of Turmero and Guacara are the most numerous. They are of small stature253, but less squat254 than the Chaymas; their eyes denote more vivacity255 and intelligence, owing less perhaps to a diversity in the race, than to a superior state of civilization. They work like freemen by the day. Though active and laborious256 during the short time they allot146 to labour, yet what they earn in two months is spent in one week, in the purchase of strong liquors at the small inns, of which unhappily the numbers daily increase.
We saw at Turmero the remains257 of the assembled militia258 of the country, and their appearance alone sufficiently indicated that these valleys had enjoyed for ages undisturbed peace. The capitan-general, in order to give a new impulse to the military service, had ordered a grand review; and the battalion259 of Turmero, in a mock fight, had fired on that of La Victoria. Our host, a lieutenant260 of the militia, was never weary of describing to us the danger of these manoeuvres, which seemed more burlesque261 than imposing262. With what rapidity do nations, apparently263 the most pacific, acquire military habits! Twelve years afterwards, those valleys of Aragua, those peaceful plains of La Victoria and Turmero, the defile264 of Cabrera, and the fertile banks of the lake of Valencia, became the scenes of obstinate265 and sanguinary conflicts between the natives and the troops of the mother-country.
South of Turmero, a mass of limestone mountains advances into the plain, separating two fine sugar-plantations, Guayavita and Paja. The latter belongs to the family of Count Tovar, who have property in every part of the province. Near Guayavita, brown iron-ore has been discovered. To the north of Turmero, a granitic266 summit (the Chuao) rises in the Cordillera of the coast, from the top of which we discern at once the sea and the lake of Valencia. Crossing this rocky ridge, which runs towards the west farther than the eye can reach, paths somewhat difficult lead to the rich plantations of cacao on the coast, to Choroni, Turiamo, and Ocumare, noted267 alike for the fertility of the soil and the insalubrity of their climate. Turmero, Maracay, Cura, Guacara, every point of the valley of Aragua, has its mountain-road, which terminates at one of the small ports on the coast.
On quitting the village of Turmero, we discover, at a league distant, an object, which appears at the horizon like a round hillock, or tumulus, covered with vegetation. It is neither a hill, nor a group of trees close to each other, but one single tree, the famous zamang del Guayre, known throughout the province for the enormous extent of its branches, which form a hemispheric head five hundred and seventy-six feet in circumference268. The zamang is a fine species of mimosa, and its tortuous269 branches are divided by bifurcation. Its delicate and tender foliage was agreeably relieved on the azure of the sky. We stopped a long time under this vegetable roof. The trunk of the zamang del Guayre,* which is found on the road from Turmero to Maracay, is only sixty feet high, and nine thick; but its real beauty consists in the form of its head. The branches extend like an immense umbrella, and bend toward the ground, from which they remain at a uniform distance of twelve or fifteen feet. The circumference of this head is so regular, that, having traced different diameters, I found them one hundred and ninety-two and one hundred and eighty-six feet. One side of the tree was entirely stripped of its foliage, owing to the drought; but on the other side there remained both leaves and flowers. Tillandsias, lorantheae, Cactus270 Pitahaya, and other parasite271 plants, cover its branches, and crack the bark. The inhabitants of these villages, but particularly the Indians, hold in veneration272 the zamang del Guayre, which the first conquerors273 found almost in the same state in which it now remains. Since it has been observed with attention, no change has appeared in its thickness or height. This zamang must be at least as old as the Orotava dragon-tree. There is something solemn and majestic in the aspect of aged165 trees; and the violation274 of these monuments of nature is severely275 punished in countries destitute of monuments of art. We heard with satisfaction that the present proprietor of the zamang had brought an action against a cultivator who had been guilty of cutting off a branch. The cause was tried, and the tribunal condemned276 the offender277. We find near Turmero and the Hacienda de Cura other zamangs, having trunks larger than that of Guayre, but their hemispherical heads are not of equal extent.
[* The mimos of La Guayre; zamang being the Indian name for the genera mimosa, desmanthus, and acacia. The place where the tree is found is called El Guayre.]
The culture and population of the plains augment in the direction of Cura and Guacara, on the northern side of the lake. The valleys of Aragua contain more than 52,000 inhabitants, on a space thirteen leagues in length, and two in width. This is a relative population of two thousand souls on a square league. The village or rather the small town of Maracay was heretofore the centre of the indigo plantations, when this branch of colonial industry was in its greatest prosperity. The houses are all of masonry278, and every court contains cocoa-trees, which rise above the habitations. The aspect of general wealth is still more striking at Maracay, than at Turmero. The anil, or indigo, of these provinces has always been considered in commerce as equal and sometimes superior to that of Guatemala. The indigo plant impoverishes279 the soil, where it is cultivated during a long series of years, more than any other. The lands of Maracay, Tapatapa, and Turmero, are looked upon as exhausted280; and indeed the produce of indigo has been constantly decreasing. But in proportion as it has diminished in the valleys of Aragua, it has increased in the province of Varinas, and in the burning plains of Cucuta, where, on the banks of the Rio Tachira, virgin land yields an abundant produce, of the richest colour.
We arrived very late at Maracay, and the persons to whom we were recommended were absent. The inhabitants perceiving our embarrassment281, contended with each other in offering to lodge282 us, to place our instruments, and take care of our mules. It has been said a thousand times, but the traveller always feels desirous of repeating it again, that the Spanish colonies are the land of hospitality; they are so even in those places where industry and commerce have diffused wealth and improvement. A family of Canarians received us with the most amiable283 cordiality; an excellent repast was prepared, and everything was carefully avoided that might act as any restraint on us. The master of the house, Don Alexandro Gonzales, was travelling on commercial business, and his young wife had lately had the happiness of becoming a mother. She was transported with joy when she heard that on our return from the Rio Negro we should proceed by the banks of the Orinoco to Angostura, where her husband was. We were to bear to him the tidings of the birth of his first child. In those countries, as among the ancients, travellers are regarded as the safest means of communication. There are indeed posts established, but they make such great circuits that private persons seldom entrust284 them with letters for the llanos or savannahs of the interior. The child was brought to us at the moment of our departure: we had seen him asleep at night, but it was deemed indispensable that we should see him awake in the morning. We promised to describe his features exactly to his father, but the sight of our books and instruments somewhat chilled the mother’s confidence. She said “that in a long journey, amidst so many cares of another kind, we might well forget the colour of her child’s eyes.”
On the road from Maracay to the Hacienda de Cura we enjoyed from time to time the view of the lake of Valencia. An arm of the granitic chain of the coast stretches southward into the plain. It is the promontory285 of Portachuelo which would almost close the valley, were it not separated by a narrow defile from the rock of La Cabrera. This place has acquired a sad celebrity286 in the late revolutionary wars of Caracas; each party having obstinately287 disputed its possession, as opening the way to Valencia, and to the Llanos. La Cabrera now forms a peninsula: not sixty years ago it was a rocky island in the lake, the waters of which gradually diminish. We spent seven very agreeable days at the Hacienda da Cura, in a small habitation surrounded by thickets.
We lived after the manner of the rich in this country; we bathed twice, slept three times, and made three meals in the twenty-four hours. The temperature of the water of the lake is rather warm, being from twenty-four to twenty-five degrees; but there is another cool and delicious bathing-place at Toma, under the shade of ceibas and large zamangs, in a torrent gushing from the granitic mountains of the Rincon del Diablo. In entering this bath, we had not to fear the sting of insects, but to guard against the little brown hairs which cover the pods of the Dolichos pruriens. When these small hairs, well characterised by the name of picapica, stick to the body, they excite a violent irritation288 on the skin; the dart215 is felt, but the cause is unperceived.
Near Cura we found all the people occupied in clearing the ground covered with mimosa, sterculia, and Coccoloba excoriata, for the purpose of extending the cultivation of cotton. This product, which partly supplies the place of indigo, has succeeded so well during some years, that the cotton-tree now grows wild on the borders of the lake of Valencia. We have found shrubs of eight or ten feet high entwined with bignonia and other ligneous creepers. The exportation of cotton from Caracas, however, is yet of small importance. It amounted at an average at La Guayra scarcely to three or four hundred thousand pounds in a year; but including all the ports of the Capitania-general, it arose, on account of the flourishing culture of Cariaco, Nueva Barcelona, and Maracaybo, to more than 22,000 quintals. The cotton of the valleys of Aragua is of fine quality, being inferior only to that of Brazil; for it is preferred to that of Carthagena, St. Domingo, and the Caribbee Islands. The cultivation of cotton extends on one side of the lake from Maracay to Valencia; and on the other from Guayca to Guigue. The large plantations yield from sixty to seventy thousand pounds a year.
During our stay at Cura we made numerous excursions to the rocky islands (which rise in the midst of the lake of Valencia,) to the warm springs of Mariara, and to the lofty granitic mountain called El Cucurucho de Coco. A dangerous and narrow path leads to the port of Turiamo and the celebrated cacao-plantations of the coast. In all these excursions we were agreeably surprised, not only at the progress of agriculture, but at the increase of a free laborious population, accustomed to toil289, and too poor to rely on the assistance of slaves. White and mulatto farmers had everywhere small separate establishments. Our host, whose father had a revenue of 40,000 piastres, possessed290 more lands than he could clear; he distributed them in the valleys of Aragua among poor families who chose to apply themselves to the cultivation of cotton. He endeavoured to surround his ample plantations with freemen, who, working as they chose, either in their own land or in the neighbouring plantations, supplied him with day-labourers at the time of harvest. Nobly occupied on the means best adapted gradually to extinguish the slavery of the blacks in these provinces, Count Tovar flattered himself with the double hope of rendering291 slaves less necessary to the landholders, and furnishing the freedmen with opportunities of becoming farmers. On departing for Europe he had parcelled out and let a part of the lands of Cura, which extend towards the west at the foot of the rock of Las Viruelas. Four years after, at his return to America, he found on this spot, finely cultivated in cotton, a little hamlet of thirty or forty houses, which is called Punta Zamuro, and which we visited with him. The inhabitants of this hamlet are almost all mulattos, Zamboes, or free blacks. This example of letting out land has been happily followed by several other great proprietors292. The rent is ten piastres for a fanega of ground, and is paid in money or in cotton. As the small farmers are often in want, they sell their cotton at a very moderate price. They dispose of it even before the harvest: and the advances, made by rich neighbours, place the debtor293 in a situation of dependence294, which frequently obliges him to offer his services as a labourer. The price of labour is cheaper here than in France. A freeman, working as a day-labourer (peon), is paid in the valleys of Aragua and in the llanos four or five piastres per month, not including food, which is very cheap on account of the abundance of meat and vegetables. I love to dwell on these details of colonial industry, because they serve to prove to the inhabitants of Europe, a fact which to the enlightened inhabitants of the colonies has long ceased to be doubtful, namely, that the continent of Spanish America can produce sugar, cotton, and indigo by free hands, and that the unhappy slaves are capable of becoming peasants, farmers, and landholders.
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1
embarked
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| 乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 )； 装载； 从事 | |
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2
barometer
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| n.气压表，睛雨表，反应指标 | |
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3
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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junction
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| n.连接，接合；交叉点，接合处，枢纽站 | |
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6
configuration
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| n.结构，布局，形态，(计算机)配置 | |
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7
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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westward
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| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
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latitude
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| n.纬度，行动或言论的自由(范围)，(pl.)地区 | |
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villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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13
scooped
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| v.抢先报道( scoop的过去式和过去分词 )；（敏捷地）抱起；抢先获得；用铲[勺]等挖（洞等） | |
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14
picturesquely
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15
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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16
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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17
ascending
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| adj.上升的，向上的 | |
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dome
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| n.圆屋顶，拱顶 | |
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19
ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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20
mica
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| n.云母 | |
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21
slate
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| n.板岩，石板，石片，石板色，候选人名单；adj.暗蓝灰色的，含板岩的；vt.用石板覆盖，痛打，提名，预订 | |
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22
cape
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| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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logic
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| n.逻辑(学)；逻辑性 | |
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vein
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| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
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veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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perpendicular
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| adj.垂直的，直立的；n.垂直线，垂直的位置 | |
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28
strata
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| n.地层（复数）；社会阶层 | |
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29
commingled
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| v.混合，掺和，合并( commingle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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30
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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31
disseminated
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| 散布，传播( disseminate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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decomposed
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| 已分解的，已腐烂的 | |
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nucleus
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| n.核，核心，原子核 | |
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dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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hue
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| n.色度；色调；样子 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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constituent
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| n.选民；成分，组分；adj.组成的，构成的 | |
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disintegration
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| n.分散，解体 | |
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quartz
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| n.石英 | |
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embedded
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| a.扎牢的 | |
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41
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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42
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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43
abounding
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| adj.丰富的，大量的v.大量存在，充满，富于( abound的现在分词 ) | |
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44
limestone
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| n.石灰石 | |
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45
orchards
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| （通常指围起来的）果园( orchard的名词复数 ) | |
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fatiguing
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| a.使人劳累的 | |
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47
evaporation
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| n.蒸发，消失 | |
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48
marsh
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| n.沼泽，湿地 | |
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49
gush
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| v.喷，涌；滔滔不绝(说话)；n.喷，涌流；迸发 | |
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50
copious
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| adj.丰富的，大量的 | |
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51
northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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52
cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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53
indigo
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| n.靛青，靛蓝 | |
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54
colonists
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| n.殖民地开拓者，移民，殖民地居民( colonist的名词复数 ) | |
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55
stony
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| adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的 | |
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56
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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57
penetrating
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| adj.（声音）响亮的，尖锐的adj.（气味）刺激的adj.（思想）敏锐的，有洞察力的 | |
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58
gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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59
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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60
attains
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的第三人称单数 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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61
glossy
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| adj.平滑的；有光泽的 | |
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62
devouring
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| 吞没( devour的现在分词 )； 耗尽； 津津有味地看； 狼吞虎咽地吃光 | |
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vegetate
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| v.无所事事地过活 | |
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64
extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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plantation
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| n.种植园，大农场 | |
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66
dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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67
vented
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| 表达，发泄（感情，尤指愤怒）( vent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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68
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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69
barometric
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| 大气压力 | |
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70
favourable
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| adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的 | |
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71
cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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72
plantations
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| n.种植园，大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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73
situated
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| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
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74
eastward
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| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
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75
predilection
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| n.偏好 | |
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76
warehouses
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| 仓库，货栈( warehouse的名词复数 ) | |
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77
germination
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| n.萌芽，发生；萌发；生芽；催芽 | |
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pulp
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| n.果肉，纸浆；v.化成纸浆，除去...果肉，制成纸浆 | |
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79
adherent
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| n.信徒，追随者，拥护者 | |
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80
germinated
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| v.（使）发芽( germinate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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81
shrub
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| n.灌木，灌木丛 | |
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82
parasitic
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| adj.寄生的 | |
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83
shrubs
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| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
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84
pulpy
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| 果肉状的，多汁的，柔软的； 烂糊； 稀烂 | |
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85
tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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86
alcoholic
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| adj.（含）酒精的，由酒精引起的；n.酗酒者 | |
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87
inverted
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| adj.反向的，倒转的v.使倒置，使反转( invert的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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88
extrication
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| n.解脱；救出，解脱 | |
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89
diminution
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| n.减少；变小 | |
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90
atmospheric
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| adj.大气的，空气的；大气层的；大气所引起的 | |
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91
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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92
agitating
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| 搅动( agitate的现在分词 )； 激怒； 使焦虑不安； （尤指为法律、社会状况的改变而）激烈争论 | |
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93
marshy
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| adj.沼泽的 | |
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94
strewed
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| v.撒在…上( strew的过去式和过去分词 )；散落于；点缀；撒满 | |
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95
compensated
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| 补偿，报酬( compensate的过去式和过去分词 )； 给（某人）赔偿（或赔款） | |
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96
Augmented
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| adj.增音的 动词augment的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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97
augment
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| vt.(使)增大，增加，增长，扩张 | |
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98
ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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99
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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100
decomposition
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| n. 分解, 腐烂, 崩溃 | |
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101
slough
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| v.蜕皮，脱落，抛弃 | |
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102
gushing
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| adj.迸出的；涌出的；喷出的；过分热情的v.喷，涌( gush的现在分词 )；滔滔不绝地说话 | |
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103
cascades
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| 倾泻( cascade的名词复数 )； 小瀑布（尤指一连串瀑布中的一支）； 瀑布状物； 倾泻（或涌出）的东西 | |
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104
mosses
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| n. 藓类, 苔藓植物 名词moss的复数形式 | |
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105
torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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106
infested
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|
| adj.为患的，大批滋生的（常与with搭配）v.害虫、野兽大批出没于( infest的过去式和过去分词 )；遍布于 | |
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107
botanist
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| n.植物学家 | |
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108
stamina
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| n.体力；精力；耐力 | |
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109
majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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110
charcoal
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| n.炭，木炭，生物炭 | |
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111
attests
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| v.证明( attest的第三人称单数 )；证实；声称…属实；使宣誓 | |
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112
impede
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| v.妨碍，阻碍，阻止 | |
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113
temperate
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| adj.温和的，温带的，自我克制的，不过分的 | |
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114
flora
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| n.(某一地区的)植物群 | |
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115
apparatus
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| n.装置，器械；器具，设备 | |
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116
stagnant
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| adj.不流动的，停滞的，不景气的 | |
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117
fatigued
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| adj. 疲乏的 | |
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118
doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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119
enchanted
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| adj. 被施魔法的，陶醉的，入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
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120
serpentine
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| adj.蜿蜒的，弯曲的 | |
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121
analogous
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| adj.相似的；类似的 | |
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122
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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123
lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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124
tint
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| n.淡色，浅色；染发剂；vt.着以淡淡的颜色 | |
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125
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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126
beverage
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| n.(水，酒等之外的)饮料 | |
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127
fermented
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| v.（使）发酵( ferment的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）激动；骚动；骚扰 | |
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128
intoxication
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| n.wild excitement;drunkenness；poisoning | |
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129
elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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130
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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131
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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132
furrowed
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| v.犁田，开沟( furrow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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133
ridges
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| n.脊( ridge的名词复数 )；山脊；脊状突起；大气层的)高压脊 | |
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134
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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135
distillation
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| n.蒸馏，蒸馏法 | |
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136
barometrical
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| 气压计的 | |
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137
granite
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| adj.花岗岩，花岗石 | |
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138
delightfully
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| 大喜，欣然 | |
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139
abated
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| 减少( abate的过去式和过去分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
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140
fragrant
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|
| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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141
adorns
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| 装饰，佩带( adorn的第三人称单数 ) | |
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142
canes
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| n.（某些植物，如竹或甘蔗的）茎( cane的名词复数 )；（用于制作家具等的）竹竿；竹杖 | |
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143
pebbles
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| [复数]鹅卵石； 沙砾； 卵石，小圆石( pebble的名词复数 ) | |
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144
proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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145
allotted
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| 分配，拨给，摊派( allot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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146
allot
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| v.分配；拨给；n.部分；小块菜地 | |
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147
poultry
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| n.家禽，禽肉 | |
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148
descant
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| v.详论，絮说；n.高音部 | |
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149
fugitive
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| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
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150
dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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151
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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152
naturalists
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| n.博物学家( naturalist的名词复数 )；（文学艺术的）自然主义者 | |
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153
tenacity
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| n.坚韧 | |
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154
ligneous
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|
| adj.木质的，木头的 | |
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155
boilers
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| 锅炉，烧水器，水壶( boiler的名词复数 ) | |
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156
affected
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|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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157
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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158
apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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159
degenerate
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| v.退步，堕落；adj.退步的，堕落的；n.堕落者 | |
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160
indigenous
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|
| adj.土产的，土生土长的，本地的 | |
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161
foliage
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| n.叶子，树叶，簇叶 | |
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162
colossal
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| adj.异常的，庞大的 | |
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163
dyke
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| n.堤，水坝，排水沟 | |
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164
lawsuits
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| n.诉讼( lawsuit的名词复数 ) | |
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165
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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166
expended
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| v.花费( expend的过去式和过去分词 )；使用（钱等）做某事；用光；耗尽 | |
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167
undertakings
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| 企业( undertaking的名词复数 )； 保证； 殡仪业； 任务 | |
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168
raffles
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| n.抽彩售物( raffle的名词复数 )v.以抽彩方式售（物）( raffle的第三人称单数 ) | |
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169
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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170
trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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171
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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172
alluring
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| adj.吸引人的，迷人的 | |
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173
crevices
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| n.（尤指岩石的）裂缝，缺口( crevice的名词复数 ) | |
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174
thickets
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| n.灌木丛( thicket的名词复数 )；丛状物 | |
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175
affinity
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| n.亲和力，密切关系 | |
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176
equilibrium
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| n.平衡，均衡，相称，均势，平静 | |
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177
azure
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| adj.天蓝色的，蔚蓝色的 | |
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178
diffused
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| 散布的，普及的，扩散的 | |
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179
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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180
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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181
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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182
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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183
onward
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|
| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
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184
depositions
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| 沉积（物）( deposition的名词复数 )； （在法庭上的）宣誓作证； 处置； 罢免 | |
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185
unctuous
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| adj.油腔滑调的，大胆的 | |
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186
graphic
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| adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的 | |
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187
sinuous
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| adj.蜿蜒的，迂回的 | |
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188
vestige
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| n.痕迹，遗迹，残余 | |
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189
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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190
vanilla
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| n.香子兰，香草 | |
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191
ribs
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|
| n.肋骨( rib的名词复数 )；（船或屋顶等的）肋拱；肋骨状的东西；（织物的）凸条花纹 | |
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192
cylindrical
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|
| adj.圆筒形的 | |
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193
buttresses
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|
| n.扶壁，扶垛( buttress的名词复数 )v.用扶壁支撑，加固( buttress的第三人称单数 ) | |
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194
penetrate
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| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
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195
lateral
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| adj.侧面的，旁边的 | |
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196
hatchet
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| n.短柄小斧；v.扼杀 | |
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197
milky
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| adj.牛奶的，多奶的；乳白色的 | |
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198
vessels
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| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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199
nutritious
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|
| adj.有营养的，营养价值高的 | |
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200
conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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201
longitude
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| n.经线，经度 | |
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202
chronometer
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| n.精密的计时器 | |
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203
serenity
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| n.宁静，沉着，晴朗 | |
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204
mariners
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| 海员，水手（mariner的复数形式） | |
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205
arid
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| adj.干旱的；(土地)贫瘠的 | |
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206
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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207
disappearance
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| n.消失，消散，失踪 | |
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208
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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209
aurora
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| n.极光 | |
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210
modifications
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| n.缓和( modification的名词复数 )；限制；更改；改变 | |
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211
embalmed
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| adj.用防腐药物保存（尸体）的v.保存（尸体）不腐( embalm的过去式和过去分词 )；使不被遗忘；使充满香气 | |
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212
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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213
virgin
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| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
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214
darting
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的现在分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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215
dart
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| v.猛冲，投掷；n.飞镖，猛冲 | |
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216
perpendicularly
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| adv. 垂直地, 笔直地, 纵向地 | |
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217
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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218
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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219
promontories
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| n.岬，隆起，海角( promontory的名词复数 ) | |
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220
parched
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| adj.焦干的；极渴的；v.（使）焦干 | |
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221
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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222
proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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223
augments
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| 增加，提高，扩大( augment的名词复数 ) | |
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224
latitudes
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| 纬度 | |
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225
elevations
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| （水平或数量）提高( elevation的名词复数 )； 高地； 海拔； 提升 | |
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226
requisite
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| adj.需要的，必不可少的；n.必需品 | |
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227
ripen
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| vt.使成熟；vi.成熟 | |
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228
barley
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| n.大麦，大麦粒 | |
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229
fecundity
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| n.生产力；丰富 | |
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230
villas
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| 别墅，公馆( villa的名词复数 )； （城郊）住宅 | |
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231
clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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232
concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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233
porcelain
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| n.瓷；adj.瓷的，瓷制的 | |
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234
proceeding
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| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
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235
eminence
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| n.卓越，显赫；高地，高处；名家 | |
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236
grove
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| n.林子，小树林，园林 | |
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237
industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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238
hydraulic
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| adj.水力的；水压的，液压的；水力学的 | |
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239
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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240
alimentary
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| adj.饮食的，营养的 | |
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241
descends
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| v.下来( descend的第三人称单数 )；下去；下降；下斜 | |
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242
maize
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| n.玉米 | |
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243
littoral
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| adj.海岸的；湖岸的；n.沿（海）岸地区 | |
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244
annually
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| adv.一年一次，每年 | |
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245
regularity
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| n.规律性，规则性；匀称，整齐 | |
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246
monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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247
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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248
edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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249
overloaded
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| a.超载的，超负荷的 | |
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250
ornaments
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| n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 )；点缀；装饰品；首饰v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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251
missionaries
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| n.传教士( missionary的名词复数 ) | |
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252
tributary
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| n.支流；纳贡国；adj.附庸的；辅助的；支流的 | |
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253
stature
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| n.（高度）水平，（高度）境界，身高，身材 | |
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254
squat
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| v.蹲坐，蹲下；n.蹲下；adj.矮胖的，粗矮的 | |
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255
vivacity
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| n.快活，活泼，精神充沛 | |
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256
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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257
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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258
militia
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| n.民兵，民兵组织 | |
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259
battalion
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| n.营；部队；大队(的人) | |
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260
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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261
burlesque
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| v.嘲弄，戏仿；n.嘲弄，取笑，滑稽模仿 | |
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262
imposing
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| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
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263
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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264
defile
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| v.弄污，弄脏；n.(山间)小道 | |
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265
obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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266
granitic
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| 花岗石的，由花岗岩形成的 | |
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267
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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268
circumference
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| n.圆周，周长，圆周线 | |
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269
tortuous
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| adj.弯弯曲曲的，蜿蜒的 | |
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270
cactus
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| n.仙人掌 | |
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271
parasite
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| n.寄生虫；寄生菌；食客 | |
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272
veneration
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| n.尊敬，崇拜 | |
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273
conquerors
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| 征服者，占领者( conqueror的名词复数 ) | |
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274
violation
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| n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯 | |
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275
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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276
condemned
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| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
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277
offender
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| n.冒犯者，违反者，犯罪者 | |
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278
masonry
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| n.砖土建筑；砖石 | |
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279
impoverishes
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| v.使（某人）贫穷( impoverish的第三人称单数 )；使（某物）贫瘠或恶化 | |
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280
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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281
embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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282
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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283
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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284
entrust
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| v.信赖，信托，交托 | |
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285
promontory
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| n.海角；岬 | |
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286
celebrity
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| n.名人，名流；著名，名声，名望 | |
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287
obstinately
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| ad.固执地，顽固地 | |
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288
irritation
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| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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289
toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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290
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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291
rendering
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| n.表现，描写 | |
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292
proprietors
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| n.所有人，业主( proprietor的名词复数 ) | |
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293
debtor
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| n.借方，债务人 | |
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294
dependence
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| n.依靠，依赖；信任，信赖；隶属 | |
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