Baxa and Alhama. 81 



Puerto del Rey, to Almunecar on the Mediterranean coast. 

 (See section 13.) 



From the above slight and most imperfect sketch of the ba- 

 sins of Baza and Alhama, it appears that a deposit of gypsife- 

 rous marl, with a superjacent bed of compact paludina limestone 

 are common to each of them ; but that the latter basin is dis- 

 tinguished from the former, by a superior bed of shelly lime- 

 stone, in which the planorbis first makes its appearance, — ^by 

 two deposits of thrown coal in the neighbourhood of Arenas and 

 Jayena, — and by a tertiary marine formation, consisting of al- 

 ternating beds of calcareous sandstone and coral limestone, which 

 intervenes between the gypsiferous marl and the secondary num- 

 mulite limestone. 



The tertiary and lacustrine beds in each of these two basins 

 are in a horizontal position, and do not therefore appear to have 

 been disturbed by any causes similar to those which have ele- 

 vated the older rocks, upon whose inclined strata they have been 

 deposited. 



But causes of a different nature have, either gradually and 

 in the progress of ages, or with sudden and irresistible fury, 

 swept over them with no unsparing hand, carried away, in the 

 basin of Baza, the greatest part of the superior deposite, and 

 left extensive vestiges of destruction upon its western and east- 

 ern flanks. Nor are the effects less conspicuous in the basin of 

 Alhama. 



At the present day, streams of inconsiderable magnitude flow 

 quietly along their respective areas ; and, instead of directing 

 their course to the nearer Mediterranean, from which they are 

 intercepted by the elevated chain which borders its shores, de- 

 scend the great hydrographical valley of the Guadalquiver, and 

 join the waters of this river, which terminates in the Atlantic 

 Ocean. 



Such, I believe, are the conclusions that may be drawn from 

 observations confined to certain portions of the areas I have as- 

 signed to these two basins. A detailed and scientific examina- 



ridge near El Convento de los Nieves, about two miles from a village called 

 Bl Borgo de Ronda, nine leagues distant from Malaga, towards the north- 

 west, is worthy of the pencil of a Salvator Rosa. 



OCTOBEE DECEMBER 1830. F 



