292 COSMOS. 



of its height, which only exceeds that of Monte Rosa by 

 about 557 feet, not on account of the danger overcome 

 in its ascent, but on account of the value and multiplicity 

 of the physical and geological views which ennoble Saus- 

 sure's name, and the scene of his untiring industry. Nature 

 appears greatest where, besides its impression on the senses, 

 it is also reflected in the depths of thought. 



The series of volcanoes of Peru and Bolivia, still entirely 

 belonging to the equinoctial zone, and according to Pentland, 

 only covered with perpetual snow at an elevation of 16,945 

 feet (Darwin, Journal, 1845, p. 244), attains the maximum of 

 its elevation (22,349 feet) at about the middle of its length' 

 in the Sahama group, between 18 7' and 18 25' south lati- 

 tude. There, in the neighbourhood of Arica, appears a sin- 

 gular, bay-like bend of the shore, which corresponds with a 

 sudden alteration in the axial direction of the chain of the 

 Andes, and of the series of volcanoes lying to the west of it. 

 Thence, towards the south, the coast line, and also the vol- 

 canic fissure, no longer strike from south-east to north- 

 west, but in the direction of the meridian, a direction which 

 is maintained until near the western entrance into the Straits 

 of Magellan, for a distance of more than two thousand miles. 

 A glance at the map of the ramifications and groups of moun- 

 tains of the chain of the Andes, published by me in the year 

 1831, exhibits many other similar agreements between the 

 outline of the New Continent, and the near or distant 

 Cordilleras. Thus between the promontories of Aguja and 

 San Lorenzo (5^ to 1 south latitude), both the coast line 

 of the Pacific and the Cordilleras are directed from south 

 to north, after being directed so long from south-east to 

 north-west, between the parallels of Arica and Caxamarca ; 

 and in the same way the coast-line and the Cordilleras run 

 from south-west to north-east, from the mountain group of 

 Tmbaburu, near Quito, to that of los Robles, 78 near Popayan. 



' 3 The mica schist mountain group de los Robles (lat. 2 2') and of the 

 Paramo de las Papas (lat. 2 20') contains the Alpine lakes, Laguna de 

 S. lago and L. del Buey, scarcely six miles apart ; from the former springs 

 the Cauca, and from the latter the Magdalena, which, being soon sepa- 

 rated by a central mountain chain, only unite with each other in the 

 parallel of 9 27', in the plains of Mompox and Tenerife. The above- 

 mentioned mountain group between Popayan, Almaguer, and Timana 

 IM of great importance in connection with the geological question whether 



