where so regular as in the country of Caracas. It is far from being always from the coast to the interior, that population, commercial industry, and intellectual improvement diminishes.

SECTION IV.

ITS TEMPERATURE.

ACCORDING to its situation, which, beginning from the 12th degree of north latitude, extends towards the equinoctial line, this country might be expected to present to us only a scorching sun, and a land rendered uninhabitable by excessive heat; but nature has so diversified the temperature of its climate, that in several places the inhabitants enjoy the coolness of a perpetual spring; whilst in others, the presiding latitude exercises, without controul, the powers assigned to it.

Owing to the elevation of the land, the heat is not so insupportable as might be imagined. Along the coast, indeed, it is very great; but ascending gradually into the higher regions, the traveller finds it sensibly diminish, and observes with delight the vegetable productions of different countries concentrated in a small space. The heat in the valley of the Orinoco is intense, the thermometer rising even to 115°.

SECTION V.

ITS EARTHQUAKES AND VOLCANOES.

THE chain of the Andes contains within its bosom these materials of destruction. Earthquakes of the most tremendous nature have occurred in these regions, and from Cotopaxi to the shores of the Straits of Magellan, forty volcanoes have been counted, which discharge lava, enormous rocks, showers of ashes, great quantities of water, liquid mud, sulphur, or devastating blasts of heated air, from their

craters.

The most striking features, indeed, of the southern Andes, are those volcanic cones, whose flanks, beset with frightful crevices of immeasurable depth, are crossed by the fearless natives, by means of pendulous bridges formed of the fibres of equinoctial plants. Over these frail and tremulous passages, the natives sometimes carry the traveller in a chair attached to their backs, and bending forward the body, move with a swift and equal step; but when they reach the centre, the oscillation of the bridge is so great, that were they to stop, inevitable destruction must ensue; the native and his burden would be dashed to the bottom of a precipice, to whose profound depth the eye can hardly reach. These bridges are, from the

nature of their materials, frequently out of repair, presenting to the shuddering European who visits these countries, frightful chasms, over which the Indians step with undaunted confidence.

It is a remark made by all the inhabitants of these provinces, says Depons, speaking of Caracas in particular, that the rains, before 1792, were accompanied with lightnings and terrible claps of thunder, and that since that period, till 1804, the rain falls in great abundance, without any of the usual accompaniments of a storm. He thinks that the atmospheric electricity has been attracted and accumulated in that mass of matter which forms the Cordilleras, and that to this cause is to be ascribed the earthquakes which were experienced at Cumana in the month of December 1797, and whose ravages have been so great. They had not felt any of these commotions since 1778 and 1779.

On the 1st May 1802, at eleven in the evening, there was a pretty strong shock felt at Caracas, with oscillation from west to east. On the 20th of the same month, at five minutes past four o'clock in the evening, there was another of a vertical direction, which lasted one minute, nor did the earth resume its horizontal level for two minutes afterwards. On the 4th July following, at forty-eight minutes past two o'clock in the morning, two strong shocks

were felt; and on the same day, at thirty-five minutes past six in the morning, there was another not so strong. The causes and local origin of the earthquakes appear to be in the province of Cumana; for they are there more violent than elsewhere.

SECTION VI.

ITS SEASONS.

THE year is not divided in these parts of South America, as it is in Europe. Neither spring nor autumn are known here. Winter and summer complete the year. It is neither cold nor heat which marks their distinctive boundaries, but rain and drought.

The quantity of rain which falls in the eastern provinces of Caracas is nearly equal. The plains, mountains, and valleys, participate the blessings and inconveniencies of the rains, which are not, however, without intermission. There are days when not a drop falls; there are others, but not frequent, when it rains incessantly. It may be calculated that in the rainy season, taking one day with another, it rains for the space of three hours, and oftener in the evening than in the morning.

The drizzling rains of the polar regions are never seen here; but the sudden heavy falls of the torrid zone, and the discharges from the water-spouts rushing down with the violence of a torrent, produce more water in one single day than the rains of Europe do in six. Indeed, the total quantity of the equinoctial rains is estimated at ten times that of the arctic and antarctic rains. Hence all the rivers remain in a state of inundation during the greater part of the rainy season; those extraneous channels formed by the violence of the floods, which remain dry the rest of the year, become torrents; and the lands are covered with water to an immense distance, where the traveller descries only the tops of the tallest trees, which then serve him for land-marks. This kind of accidental sea is principally formed in the northern plains of the Orinoco, and in a space extending one hundred and fifty leagues in length and forty in breadth.

M. de Humboldt depicts the dry season as a horrible time in Guiana, and the commencement of the rainy season as the regeneration of nature. He gives an excellent picture of the return of vegetable nature on the recurrence of the rain. Then also a kind of resurrection of crocodiles and other reptiles seems to take place. The anxiety and ardour with which multitudes of horses, oxen, wild asses, and ferocious animals, come panting from the burning