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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We Forded The Guayguaza And The Rio Estevan, Which, By
Their Frequent Overflowing, Form Great Pools Of Stagnant Water.
Small
rocks of meandrites, madrepores, and other corals, either ramified or
with a rounded surface, rise in this vast plain, and seem to attest
the recent retreat of the sea.
But these masses, which are the
habitations of polypi, are only fragments imbedded in a breccia with a
calcareous cement. I say a breccia, because we must not confound the
fresh and white corallites of this very recent littoral formation,
with the corallites blended in the mass of transition-rocks,
grauwacke, and black limestone. We were astonished to find in this
uninhabited spot a large Parkinsonia aculeata loaded with flowers. Our
botanical works indicate this tree as peculiar to the New World; but
during five years we saw it only twice in a wild state, once in the
plains of the Rio Guayguaza, and once in the llanos of Cumana, thirty
leagues from the coast, near la Villa del Pao, but there was reason to
believe that this latter place had once been a conuco, or cultivated
enclosure. Everywhere else on the continent of America we saw the
Parkinsonia, like the Plumeria, only in the gardens of the Indians.
At Porto Cabello, as at La Guayra, it is disputed whether the port
lies east or west of the town, with which the communications are the
most frequent. The inhabitants believe that Porto Cabello is
north-north-west of Nueva Valencia; and my observations give a
longitude of three or four minutes more towards the west.
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