1 68 On the Pitch Lake of the Island of Trinidad. 



must for ages have rolled down great quantities of woody 

 and vegetable bodies, which from certain causes, — as the in- 

 fluence of currcn's and eddies, — may have been arrested and 

 accumulated in particular places ; they may there have un- 

 dergone those transformations and chemical changes which 

 various vegetable substances similarly situated have been 

 proved to suffer in other parts of the world. An accidental 

 fire, such as is known frequently to occur in the bowels of 

 the earth, may then have operated in separating and driving 

 off the newly formed bitumen more or less combined with 

 siliceous and argillaceous earths, which forcing its way 

 through the surface, and afterwards becoming inspissated 

 by exposure to the air, may have occasioned such scenes as 

 I have ventured to describe. The only other country ac- 

 curately resembling this part of Trinidad, of which I recol- 

 lect to have read, is that which borders on the Gulf of 

 Taman in Grim Tartary : from the representation of tra- 

 vellers, springs of naphtha and petroleum equally abound, -. 

 and they describe volcanic mounds precisely simitar to 

 those of Point Icaque. Pallas's explanation of their origin 

 seems to nie very satisfactory ; and I think it not improbable 

 that the river Don and Sea of Azof may have acted the 

 same part in producing these appearances in the one case, 

 as the Orinoco and Gulf of Paria appear to have done in 

 the other*. It may be supposed that the destruction of a 

 forest or perhaps even a great savanna on the spot, would 

 be a more obvious mode of accounting for this singular 

 phaenomenon ; but, as I shall immediately state, all this 



f)art of the island is of recent alluvial formation, and the 

 and all aUfng this coast is daily receiving a considerable 

 accession from the surrounding water. The pitch lake 

 with the circumjacent tract being now on the margin of 

 the sea, must in like manner have had an origin of no very 

 . distant date; besides, according to the above representation 

 of Capt. Mallet, and which has been frequently corrobo- 

 rated, a fluid bitumen oozes up and rises to the surface of 

 the water on both sides of the island, not where ihe sea haa 

 encroached on and overwhelmed the ready-formed land, 

 but where it is obviously in a very rapid manner depositing 

 and forming a new soil. 



From a consideration of the great hardness, the specific 

 gravity, and the general external characters of the specimens 

 submitted a few years ago to the examination of Mr.Hatchett, 



* Vide Uni; ersal Magazine for February 1808, Mrs. Gutlirie'» Tour in 

 tlie Tauride, or Voyages de Pallas. 



that 



