80 VIEWS OF NATURE. 



tain system, forms an isolated group, the highest points of 

 which, Itacolumi and Itambe, do not rise above an elevation 

 of 900 toises, or 5755 English feet. The eastern portion of 

 the ridge most contiguous to the sea is the only part that 

 follows a regular inclination from S.S.W. to N.N.E., increas- 

 ing in breadth and diminishing in g^-^ral elevation as it 

 approaches further westward. The chaiu of the Parecis hills 

 approximates to the rivers Itenes and Guapore, in the same 

 manner as the mountains of Aguapehi and San Fernando 

 (south of Villabella) approach the lofty Andes of Cochabamba 

 and Santa Cruz de la Sierra. 



There is no direct connection between the two mountain 

 systems of the Atlantic and South-sea coasts (the Bra- 

 zilian and the Peruvian Cordilleras); Western Brazil being 

 separated from Eastern or Upper Peru by the low lands of 

 the province of Chiquitos, which is a longitudinal valley that 

 inclines from north to south, and communicates both with the 

 plains of the Amazon and of the Rio de la Plata. In these 

 regions, as in Poland and Russia, a ridge of land, sometimes 

 imperceptible (termed in Slavonic Uwcdy}, forms the line of 

 separation between different rivers; as for instance, between 

 the Pilcomayo and Madeira, between the Aguapehi and Gua- 

 pore, and between the Paraguay and the Rio Topayos. The 

 ridge (seuil) extends from Chayanta and Pomabamba (19 

 20 lat.,) in a south-easterly direction, and after intersecting 

 the depressed tracts of the province of Chiquitos, (which has 

 become almost unknown to geographers since the expulsion 

 of the Jesuits,) forms to the north-east, where some scattered 

 mountains are again to be met with, the divortia aquarum 

 at the sources of the Baures and near Villabella (15 

 17 lat.) 



This water-line of separation which is so important to the 

 general intercourse and growing civilization of different 

 nations corresponds in the northern hemisphere of South 

 America with a second line of demarcation (2 3 lat.) 

 which separates the district of the Orinoco from that of the 

 Rio Negro and the Amazon. These elevations or risings in 

 the midst of the plains (terree tumor es, according to Frontinus) 

 may almost be regarded as undeveloped mountain-systems, 

 designed to connect two apparently isolated groups, the Sierra 

 Parime and the Brazilian highlands, to the Andes chain of 



