Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Western Coasts Are Bordered By An
Enormous Wall Of Mountains, Rich In Precious Metals Wherever Volcanic
Fire Has Not Pierced Through The Eternal Snow.
This is the Cordillera
of the Andes.
Summits of trap-porphyry rise beyond three thousand
three hundred toises, and the mean height of the chain* is one
thousand eight hundred and fifty toises. (* In New Grenada, Quito, and
Peru, according to measurements taken by Bouguer, La Condamine, and
myself.) It stretches in the direction of a meridian, and sends into
each hemisphere a lateral branch, in the latitudes of 10 degrees
north, and 16 and 18 degrees south. The first of these two branches,
that of the coast of Caracas, is of considerable length, and forms in
fact a chain. The second branch, the Cordillera of Chiquitos and of
the sources of the Guapore, is very rich in gold, and widens toward
the east, in Brazil, into vast tablelands, having a mild and temperate
climate. Between these two transverse chains, contiguous to the Andes,
an isolated group of granitic mountains is situated, from 3 to 7
degrees north latitude; which also runs parallel to the Equator, but,
not passing the meridian of 71 degrees, terminates abruptly towards
the west, and is not united to the Andes of New Grenada. These three
transverse chains have no active volcanoes; we know not whether the
most southern, like the two others, be destitute of trachytes or
trap-porphyry. None of their summits enter the limit of perpetual
snow; and the mean height of the Cordillera of La Parime, and of the
littoral chain of Caracas, does not reach six hundred toises, though
some of its summits rise fourteen hundred toises above the level of
the sea.* (* We do not reckon here, as belonging to the chain of the
coast, the Nevados and Paramos of Merida and of Truxillo, which are a
prolongation of the Andes of New Grenada.) The three transverse chains
are separated by plains entirely closed towards the west, and open
towards the east and south-east.
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