182 THE SAVANNA OF ARIPO. 



These Savannas of Trinidad stand, it must be remem- 

 bered, in the very line where, on sucli a theory, they might 

 be exjiected to stand, along- the newest deposit ; the great 

 band of sand, gravel, and clay rubbish Avhicli stretches across 

 tlie island at the mountain-foot, its liigliest point in thirty-six 

 miles being only 220 feet an elevation far less than the cor- 

 responding depression of the Bocas, which has parted Trinidad 

 from the main Cordillera. That the rubbish on this line was 

 deposited by a river or estuary is as clear to me as that the 

 river was either a very rapid one, or subject to violent and 

 lofty floods, as the Oroonoco is now. For so are best ex- 

 plained not merely the sheets of gravel, hut the huge piles of 

 boulder which have accumulated at the mouth of the moun- 

 tain gorges on the northern side. 



As for the southern shore of this supposed channel of the 

 Oroonoco, it at once catches the eye of any one standing on 

 the northern rani^e. He must see that he is on one shore of 

 a vast channel, the other shore of which is formed by the 

 ]\Iontserrat, Tamana, and ^lanzanilla hills ; far lower now 

 than the northern range, Tamana only being OA^er a thousand 

 feet, but doubtless, in past ages, far higher than now. No 

 one can doubt this who has seen the extraordinary degra- 

 dation going on still about the summits, or who remembers 

 that the strata, whether tertiary or lower chalk, have been, 

 over the greater part of the island, upheaved, faulted, set 



