816 CERHOS L)E 



the tropics, as well as in the temperate zone. The violent 

 winds of Neiva are not the effect of a repercussion of the 

 trade-winds ; they rise where those winds cannot penetrate ; 

 and if the mountains of the Upper Orinoco, the tops of which 

 are generally crowned with trees, were more elevated, they 

 would produce the same impetuous movements in the at- 

 mosphere as we observe in the Cordilleras of Peru, of 

 Abyssinia, and of Thibet. The intimate connection that 

 exists between the direction of rivers, the height and dis- 

 position of the adjacent mountains, the movements of the 

 atmosphere, and the salubrity of the climate, are subjects 

 well worthy of attention. The study of the surface and the 

 inequalities of the soil would indeed be irksome and useless 

 were it not connected with more general considerations. 



At the distance of six miles from the island of Piedra 

 Raton we passed, first, on the east, the mouth of the Rio 

 Sipapo, called Tipapu by the Indians; and then, on the 

 west, the mouth of the Rio Vichada. Near the latter are 

 some rocks covered by the water, that form a small cascade 

 or raudalito. The Rio Sipapo, which Father Grili went up 

 in 1757, and which he says is twice as broad as the Tiber, 

 comes from a considerable chain of mountains, which in its 

 southern part bears the name of the river, and joins the 

 group of Calitamini and of Cunavami. Next to the Peak 

 of Duida, which rises above the mission of Esmeralda, the 

 Cerros of Sipapo appeared to me the most lofty of the whole 

 Cordillera of Parima. They form an immense wall of rocks, 

 shooting up abruptly from the plain, its craggy ridge of 

 running from S.S.E. to N.N.W. I believe these crags, 

 these indentations, which equally occur in the sandstone of 

 Montserrat in Catalonia,* are owing to blocks of granite 

 heaped together. The Cerros de Sipapo wear a different 

 aspect every hour of the day. At sunrise the thick vege- 

 tation with which these mountains are clothed is tinged 

 with that dark green inclining to brown, which is peculiar 

 to a region where trees with coriaceous leaves prevail. 

 Broad and strong shadows are projected on the neigh- 

 bouring plain, and form a contrast with the vivid light 



* From them the name of Montserrat is derived, Monte Serrato 

 signifying a mountain ridged or jagged like a saw. 





