2 HISTORY OF THE [BOOK. i. 



distinct, and visibly circumscribed, it has the exact 

 resemblance of an immense body of water, while the 

 mountains appear like so many islands in the midst of 

 a beautiful lake. As the sun increases in force, the 

 prospect varies; the incumbent vapours fly upward, 

 and melt into air; disclosing all the beauties of nature, 

 and the triumphs of industry, heightened and embel- 

 lished by the full blaze of a tropical sun. In the equa- 

 torial season, scenes of still greater magnificence fre- 



o o 



qucntly present themselves; for, while all is calm and 

 serene in the higher regions, the clouds are seen be- 

 low sweeping along the sides of the mountains in vast 

 bodies; till, growing more ponderous by accumula- 

 tion, they fall at length in torrents of water on the 

 plains. The sound of the tempest is distinctly heard 

 by the spectator above ; the distant lightening is seen 

 to irradiate the gloom; while the thunder, reverbera- 

 ted in a thousand echoes, rolls far beneath his feet. 



But lofty as the tropical mountains generally are, it 

 is wonderfully true, that all the known parts of their 

 summits furnish incontestible evidence that the sea 

 had once dominion over them. Even their appear- 

 ance at a distance affords an argument in support of 

 this conclusion. Their ridges resemble billows, and 

 their various inequalities, inflexions, and convexities, 

 ^eem justly ascribable to the fluctuations of the deep. 

 \s in other countries too, marine shells are found in 

 at abundance in various parts of these heights. I 



ve seen on a mountain in the interior parts of Ja- 

 maica petrified oysters dug up, which perfectly re- 

 sembled, in the most minute circumstances, the large 



