4 i A.FCIETTT EXTENT. 



images, or more precise ideas, by comparing our landscapes 

 with those of the equinoctial regions. It cannot be too 

 often repeated that nature, in every zone, whether wild 

 or cultivated, smiling or majestic, lias an individual cha- 

 racter. The impressions which she excites are infinitely 

 varied, like the emotions produced by works of genius, 

 according to the age in which they were conceived, and the 

 diversity of language from which they in part derive their 

 charm. We must limit our comparisons merely to dimen- 

 sions and external form. We may institute a parallel 

 between the colossal summit of Mont Blanc and the 

 Himalaya Mountains; the cascades of the Pyrenees and 

 those of the Cordilleras : but these comparisons, useful with 

 respect to science, fail to convey an idea of the character- 

 istics of nature in the temperate and torrid zones. On the 

 banks of a lake, in a vast forest, at the foot of summits 

 covered with eternal snow, it is not the mere magnitude 

 of the objects which excites our admiration. That which 

 speaks to the wul, which causes such profound and varied 

 emotions, escapes our measurements as it does the forms 

 of language. Those who feel powerfully the charms of 

 nature cannot venture on comparing one with another, 

 scenes totally different in character. 



But it is not alone the picturesque beauties of the lake 

 of Valencia that have given celebrity to its banks. This 

 basin presents several other phenomena, and suggests ques- 

 tions, the solution of which is interesting alike to physical 

 science and to the well-being of the inhabitants. "What are 

 the causes of the diminution of the waters of the lake ? 

 Is this diminution more rapid now than in former ages ? 

 Can we presume that an equilibrium between the waters 

 flowing in and the waters lost will be shortly re-established, 

 or may we apprehend that the lake will entirely disappear ? 



According to astronomical observations made at La Vic- 

 toria, Hacienda de Cura, Nueva Valencia, and Gruigue, the 

 length of the lake in its present state from Cagua to 

 Gruayos, is ten leagues, or twenty-eight thousand eight 

 hundred toises. Its breadth is very unequal. If we judge 

 fr.om the latitudes of the mouth of the Rio Cura and the 

 village of Gruigue, it nowhere surpasses 2*3 leagues, or six 

 thousand five hundred toises ; most commonly it is but four 



