Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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This Calcareous Group Presents A Majestic Aspect, As Seen
From The Anchorage Near The Cayo De Piedras.
Xagua and Batabano are
low coasts; and I believe that, in general, west of the meridian of
Matanzas, there is no hill more than 200 toises high, with the
exception of the Pan de Guaixabon.
The land in the interior of the
island is gently undulated, as in England; and it rises only from 45
to 50 toises above the level of the sea. The objects most visible at a
distance, and most celebrated by navigators, are the Pan de Matanzas,
a truncated cone which has the form of a small monument; the Arcos de
Canasi, which appear between Puerto Escondido and Jaruco, like small
segments of a circle; the Mesa de Mariel, the Tetas de Managua, and
the Pan de Guaixabon. This gradual slope of the limestone formations
of the island of Cuba towards the north and west indicates the
submarine connection of those rocks with the equally low lands of the
Bahama Islands, Florida and Yucatan.
Intellectual cultivation and improvement were so long restricted to
the Havannah and the neighbouring districts, that we cannot be
surprised at the ignorance prevailing among the inhabitants respecting
the geologic formation of the Copper Mountains. Don Francisco Ramirez,
a traveller versed in chemical and mineralogical science, informed me
that the western part of the island is granitic, and that he there
observed gneiss and primitive slate. Probably the alluvial deposits of
auriferous sand which were explored with much ardour* at the beginning
of the conquest, to the great misfortune of the natives came from
those granitic formations (* At Cubanacan, that is, in the interior of
the island, near Jagua and Trinidad, where the auriferous sands have
been washed by the waters as far as the limestone soil. Martyr
d'Anghiera, the most intelligent writer on the Conquest, says: "Cuba
is richer in gold than Hispaniola (San Domingo); and at the moment I
am writing, 180,000 castillanos of ore have been collected at Cuba."
Herrera estimates the tax called King's-fifth (quinto del Rey), in the
island of Cuba, at 6000 pesos, which indicates an annual product of
2000 marks of gold, at 22 carats; and consequently purer than the gold
of Sibao in San Domingo. In 1804 the mines of Mexico altogether
produced 7000 marks of gold; and those of Peru 3400. It is difficult,
in these calculations, to distinguish between the gold sent to Spain
by the first Conquistadores, that obtained by washings, and that which
had been accumulated for ages in the hands of the natives, who were
pillaged at will. Supposing that in the two islands of Cuba and San
Domingo (in Cubanacan and Cibao) the product of the washings was 3000
marks of gold, we find a quantity three times less than the gold
furnished annually (1790 to 1805) by the small province of Choco. In
this supposition of ancient wealth there is nothing improbable; and if
we are surprised at the scanty produce of the gold-washings attempted
in our days at Cuba and San Domingo, which were heretofore so
prolific, it must be recollected that at Brazil also the product of
the gold-washings has fallen, from 1760 to 1820, from 6600 gold
kilogrammes to less than 595.
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