236 



THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



Napoleon III., "his spirit is not dead. It lives with 

 me : I am his political executor, and bend my best 

 energies to the execution of his vast designs." 



We have a great political spectacle to be wrought out, 

 therefore, before our own eyes — let us watch it. 



France is now, so far as agriculture is concerned, 

 about in the same position as we were under the Stuarts. 



We know our own strength, and where it com6s from. 

 But the same means that conduced to our wealth, will 

 they prove effectual for France — that is the question ? 

 Which wjll redound most to her profit, to produce sol- 

 diers or mutton ? to increase her teritoriies, or to cul- 

 tivate them ? Such considerations may well have their 

 weight with the British farmer. F. B. S. 



ON THE INFLUENCE OF CLEARINGS IN THE DIMINUTION 

 OF RIVERS AND STREAMS. 



[translated from the " JOURNAL d'aGRICULTURE PRATIQUE."] 



{Continued.) 



In leaving Ibarra, on our return to Quito, we cross a 

 charming valley in wliich we meet with the Lake of San 

 Pablo. The Indians preserve its ancient name of Chilcapan. 

 T found that it is elevated 2,763 metres above the ocean. 

 The temperature corresponding with tliis is not favourable 

 to the cultivation of wheat or maize ; but we saw numerous 

 fields of barley, oats, and potatoes. The level country con- 

 eists of fine pasturages ; the hills are covered with sheep, 

 which are reared for the exportation of the wool used by 

 the manufacturers. The villages in Hie vicinily of the lake 

 were in existence befoie the conquest, and the mass of the 

 population is still purely Indian, preserving its customs and 

 idioms. Everything, in short, appears in the same state in 

 which they existed under the empire of the Inoas ; the 

 only essential difference it is possible to discover is, zhe 

 substitution of the x^asturage of sheep for that of the llamas. 

 However, these last animals are still common enough ; we 

 frequently met on the roads droves of llamas, conducted by 

 an Indian who directed them, laden witli merchandise, to 

 the neighbouring towns. 



It is a fact, admitted by everybody, that the plateau of 

 San Pablo has never been covered with wood. Under the 

 Incas it was still a pastoral country. Sheep farms estab- 

 lished more than a century back on the borders of the lake 

 have not seen the shores extended ; and the road which 

 was taken by Huapia-Capai, when he set out from Quito 

 to make the conquest of Otavalu, still determines the limits 

 of the waters. 



The Cordillera which separates the Valley of San Pablo 

 from the coast of the South Sea is covered on the eastern 

 slope with impenetrable forests. I notice this circumstance 

 because I am convinced that an extensive clearing of tim- 

 ber taking place below an alpine lake, though at a consider- 

 able distance, would still influence the level of the water. 



Without going far from the locality which 1 have now 

 made known, I might speak of the singular Lake of Cui- 

 cocha, which occupies a trachytic basin, in wliich two isles, 

 examined with much care by Colonel Hall, attest the 

 stability and constancy of its level. The study of the Lake 

 of Yagiiar Cocha, or the Lake of Blood, so called since 

 Huajina Capai reddened its waters with the blood of 30,000 

 Indian canares by cutting their tliroats, would lead us to a 

 similar result. _ These two lakes have no outlet, but I 

 have chosen in preference that of Chilcapan, precisely 

 because it has a natural opening to the north, by which 

 flows the Rio Blanco. I mshed to show that thus, as I 

 have said before, the observations made upon open lakes 

 are not to be rejected. The effect that tends to produce 

 a_ water-course, issuing from a lake by a gully, will also 

 dig it deeper, and consequently lower the waters. I have 

 shown that, in spite of this circumstance, the waters of 

 Chilcapan have not been perceptibly lowered. In examining 

 attentively the trappean rock whence the Rio Blanco takes 

 Its rise, I saw nothing that indicated an erosive action in 

 the water-course. In the numerous cascades whicli I have 

 also been enabled to examine, I think I have noticed that a 

 mass of water might in falling cut deeply the hardest stones ; 

 but 1 have not found that waier had a very decided action 

 When It flows over a rock, unless, as is generally the case 

 with toreents, the stream drags with it boulders, the friction 

 of which wears the surface over which they slide. 



I shall finish what I have to say upon the lakes of South 

 America by speaking of that of Quilatoa, situated in the 

 other hemisphere, because it has been correctly observed at 

 two periods sufbciently distant from each other, namely, 

 1740 and 1831. 



Those who make a stay at Latacunga, a city situated at a 

 short; distance from Cotopaxi, often hear speak of the 

 wonders of the Laguna Quilatoa. From time to time it 

 throws up flames which destroy the shrubs. It produces 

 frequent detonations, whicli are heard at very great dis- 

 tances. It did not require more to instigate Condamira, 

 who, in September, 1738, found himself at Latacunga, to 

 undertake a journey to the Lake of Quilatoa. He gives to 

 this lake a diameter of 20u toises (1,270 feet English), for 

 it is circular. The shore round occupied about 20 toises 

 more. 



On the 28th November, 1831, T found myself in my turn 

 near the Lake of Quilatoa, which I cannot compare to any 

 thing else than a crater, the bottom of which is occupied 

 with water. I found that it was elevated 3,918 metres 

 (about 12,850 feet), that is to say, it belongs to acold region. 

 In fact, it is surrounded with immense pasturages, and 503 

 metres lower are the eheepfolds of Pliilipeitzin. To the 

 east the cordillera of the Andes is covered down to the 

 South Sea with forests, almost unknown. The information 

 given me by the shepherds soon dissipated in my mind all 

 the wonders that were attributed to the Lake of Quilatoa. 

 Never had they seen flames issuing from the waters ; never 

 had they heard detonations. The result of my excursion 

 was, to ascertain that things remained in the same state in 

 whicli they weie at the time of La Condaniiue's journey. 



The study of lakes, so common in Asia, will probably 

 lead to a conclusion conformable to that with the deductions 

 made from tlie observations in South America, namely, that 

 the waters flowing from a country diminish in propor- 

 tion as the clearing of the forests are multiplied, and culti- 

 vation becomes extended. The works of Humboldt, m 

 throwing so new a light over that part of the globe, appears 

 to leave but little doubt on that subject. After having shown 

 that the system of the Altai diminishes to a range otluUs in 

 the Steppes ofKerghes, and that consequently the Oural 

 chain is not united to the Altai', as is generally believed, 

 the celebrated geographer shows tliat just at the point 

 where il was the custom to place the Alghinic mountains, 

 commences a remarkable region of lakes, which are con- 

 tinued in the plains traversed by the rivers Icliim, Ouisk, 

 and Ob.* It will be said that these lakes are the residue 

 of the evaporation from a great body of water which for- 

 merly covered the country, and which have been broken 

 into so many distinct lakes by the conformation of the soil. 

 In crossing the Steppes of Baraba, in going from Tobolsk 

 to Baraval, Humboldt states that everywhere the drying-up 

 increases rapidly fi-om the eSect of cuhivation. 



It remains for us to examine the lakes of Europe in the 

 same point of view that we have token. I have gone too 

 rapidly over those of Switzerland, but? fortunately an illus- 

 trious observer has left us documents proper to funiish us 

 with new proofs of the influence of cultivation upon tha 

 diminution of the waters. 



Humboldt's Fragments Aslatlques 1. 1, p. 40, 60. 



