Jotirth. 

 NORTHERN REGIONS OF SOUTH AMERICA. 



CHAPTER I. 



VENEZUELA. 



|EW GRANADA is almost entirely a mountain 

 region, occupied by the northern end of the Andes, 

 |r ^_._, except where it slopes down towards the Isthmus 

 oTTanama and the Caribbean Sea. Venezuela, however, 

 contains three distinct zones or characters of country moun- 

 tains, forests, and open plains. The mountain regions, whicl 

 are also three in number, are separated by wide plains, 

 the west, the mountains belong to the Andes-being spurs 

 that range-a large portion consisting of table-lands, call. 

 paramos, from 10,000 to 14,000 feet above the sea-level 

 Amono them lies the Lake of Maracaibo, ninety-two mile; 

 length! and eighty-two in width-the largest in South 

 America On the north-east is the Sierra de Bergantm, and 

 in the south-east the Sierra de Parima. The forests extend 



