TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 119 
about 100 leagues from north to south ; and its width varying from 50 
to 70 leagues. It is bounded on the north by the Atlantic Ocean, and 
on the west by a low mountain range, which separates it from the 
great inland province of Piauhy, and consists for the most part of 
sandy or gravelly plains, which remind the traveller of the descriptions 
of the Pampas of Buenos Ayres. Boulders of granite, gneiss and quartz, 
sometimes of four feet diameter, and more or less rounded, occa- 
sionally occur ; and here and there a low ridge of gneiss rock crops out, 
dipping at a very high angle to the N.W. For many leagues from the 
coast, the characteristic and prevailing vegetation of the plains is a 
beautiful species of palm, called Carnahuba by the Brazilians ( Corypha 
cerifera of Martius), while that of the ridge of gneiss consists of 
various Cactez (of the genus Cereus) and a large Bromelia, At a dis- 
tance of about eighty leagues from the north coast, and ten leagues 
below the Villa do Icé, the nearly monotonous level of the country is 
broken by a mountain range, which nmiakes its appearance to the east- 
ward. This is the Serra de Pereira, which runs S.W. and N.E., and 
is sixteen leagues in length, and its greatest height about 1000 feet 
above the surrounding plain. Its S.W. extremity is entirely of gneiss, 
but at its base is a coarse red conglomerate, containing rounded frag- 
ments of both primitive and secondary rocks. 
The country between Icé and the small Villa do Crato, thirty-four 
leagues to the S.W., is of a more hilly undulating character; more 
abundantly wooded, and only occasionally opening into the large 
campos or plains of the north. In this tract, gold has been found in 
small particles interspersed in a dark-coloured diluvial soil, near the 
Rio Jaguaribe, but not in sufficient abundance to repay the speculators. 
At about eighteen leagues south of Crato, the gneiss rocks are replaced 
by a gray-coloured primitive clay slate, and at the termination of this, 
the secondary stratified series begins, the few rocks occurring from 
thence to Crato, consisting of a white coarse-grained sandstone. Crato 
stands in the middle of a large undulating valley among hills, which 
are the flanks or lateral spurs of the long chain which separates the 
provinces of the coast from that of Piauhy to the west, and which here 
receives the name of Serra de Araripe. The highest parts of this range 
do not rise more than from 1200 to 1500 feet above the town of 
Crato; their tops are perfectly level, and continue so for many leagues 
to the W. and S., forming what the Brazilians call taboleiras or table- 
lands. In all directions these hills consist of a white-coloured sand- 
stone, which has sometimes a reddish tinge. In the bed of one of the 
largest streams, a section of the strata, to a considerable depth, exposes 
a bed of limestone three feet thick, beneath the sandstone, and resting 
upon a seam of impure coal two feet thick, which in its turn is placed 
upon another and lower bed of limestone. In these limestones no 
fossil remains could be found ; the strata are all perfectly horizontal, 
and the level appearance of the whole Serra makes it probable they 
are so throughout. 
About fourteen leagues to the south from Crato, is a branch or spur 
of this Serra, which projects ten leagues to the eastward, on the south 
side of which is a small villa called Barra do Jardim, situated in a 
