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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South Of The
Cataract Of Para, At The Confluence Of The Caura And The Erevato, The
Mission Of San Luis Was Then Situated; And A Road By Land Led Thence
To Angostura, The Capital Of The Province.
All these attempts at
civilization have been fruitless.
No village now exists above the
Raudal of Mura; and here, as in many other parts of the colonies, the
natives may be said to have reconquered the country from the
Spaniards. The valley of Caura may become one day or other highly
interesting from the value of its productions, and the communications
which it affords with the Rio Ventuari, the Carony, and the Cuyuni. I
have shown above the importance of the four tributary streams which
the Orinoco receives from the mountains of Parima. Near the mouth of
the Caura, between the villages of San Pedro de Alcantara and San
Francisco de Aripao, a small lake of four hundred toises in diameter
was formed in 1790, by the sinking of the ground, consequent on an
earthquake. It was a portion of the forest of Aripao, which sunk to
the depth of eighty or a hundred feet below the level of the
neighbouring land. The trees remained green for several months; and
some of them, it was believed, continued to push forth leaves beneath
the water. This phenomenon is the more worthy of attention as the soil
of these countries is probably granitic. I doubt the secondary
formations of the Llanos being continued southward as far as the
valley of Caura.
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