ILLINISSA AND CORAZON. 235 



ascend them, he could at least sketch them, which was 

 something. He visited and sketched Corazon, Illinissa, 

 and Cayambe. 



Of the various summits of the Cordilleras, the heights 

 of which have been determined with any precision, Cay- 

 ambe is the loftiest after Chimborazo. From angles 

 which he took on the Exido of Quito, to observe the 

 progress of the terrestrial refraction at different hours of 

 the day, Humboldt found its elevation to be eighteen 

 thousand seven hundred feet. Its form, which was that 

 of a truncated cone, reminded him of the peak of Zolima, 

 as he saw it looming above the forests of Quindiu. 

 Among the many snow clad mountains that surrounded 

 the city of Quito he considered it the most beautiful, as 

 well as the most majestic, and it never ceased to excite 

 his admiration when at sunset it threw its vast shadow 

 over the plain. 



Illinissa was grand and picturesque. Its summit was 

 divided into two pyramidal points, which were probably 

 the wrecks of a volcano that had fallen in. These pyra- 

 mids were visible at an enormous distance. 



Corazon derived its name from the form of its summit, 

 which was nearly that of a heart. It was on the western 

 Cordillera, between Illinissa and Pichincha. Bouguer and 

 Condamine ascended this mountain in July, 1738. " We 

 began our journey," says Condamine, in his celebrated 

 Voyage to the Equator, " in very fine weather. The 

 persons whom we had left in our tents soon lost sight of 

 us among the clouds, which appeared to us only a mist,, 

 from the time we entered them. A cold and piercing 

 wind covered us in a short time with icicles. In several 

 places we were forced to scale the rock, by climbing with 



