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impetuous as the St. Lawrence or the Mississipi, where 

 only a few days or hours before there had been notbing but 

 a dry and apparently deserted water-course. Floods during 

 the rainy season were frequent and appalling, the waters often 

 rising from thirty to fifty feet above their usual level. Tbis 

 arose from the immense quantity of rain which fell in a 

 short time, and from the steepness of the hill-sides, which 

 prevented much being absorbed by the thirsty earth. In 

 the broad valleys of the interior the inundations were 

 not so deep as in the narrow ones, though far more 

 extensive. 



In the interior, the country consisted chiefly of extensive 

 plains, many hundred miles in extent, whose level was in 

 many instances a few feet only above that of the sea. 

 These were but imperfectly covered with vegetation, and 

 singularly deficient in water during the greatest part of the 

 year, rendering the course of adventurers passing over 

 them dangerous in the extreme. 



The uncertainty of the rains, and the general flatness 

 of the surface of the country, produced their natural 

 effect upon the course and bed of the rivers. Those in the 

 narrow valleys, where the fall from the high regions was 

 considerable, and where the surrounding hills were steep 

 and extensive, were, when full, deep and impetuous, their 

 channels being constantly worn down by the action of the 

 torrent. Those in the more level ground, where there was 

 scarcely any fall, were broad and usually shallow, an 

 inundation immediately overflowing the banks, and thus 

 preventing any inordinate attrition ; and when at last they 

 had reached their lowest level, they spread themselves over 

 a wide extent, and thus became most easily acted on by 

 atmospheric and other agencies. 



It was at one time a curious problem — What became of 

 those rivers which flowed into the interior of the country ? 

 Did they go into some vast inland sea or central swamp ? Or 

 did they disappear entirely by evaporation, &c, ? Explorers 

 had set out to determine this ; and though there had been 

 at first some discrepancy in their accounts, the true state 

 of the case came out at last. It appeared that during the 

 rainy seasons the rivers seemed to empty themselves into a 

 vast sea, which proved to be nothing more than an extensive 

 inundation ; and during the dry seasons they appeared to 

 terminate in a gigantic swamp, which was in reality nothing 

 more than the earth kept constantly soaked by water per- 

 meating it. From these swamps little water drained away, 

 the whole of that from the south-eastern side of the island 



