302 



THE HTJANUCO AND THE PASCO. 



inclosed by these chains, is nearly half the length of the basin 

 of Chucuito or Titicaca. Two mountains covered with 

 eternal snow, seen from the town of Lima, and which the 

 inhabitants name Toldo de la Nieve, belong to the western 

 chain, that of Huarocheri. 



North-west of the vallies of Salcabamba, in the parallel of 

 the ports of Huaura and Guarmey, between 11 and 10 

 latitude, the two chains unite in the knot of the Huanuco and 

 the Pasco, celebrated for the mines of Yauricocha or Santa 

 Bosa. There rise two peaks of colossal height, the Nevados 

 of Sasaguanca and of La Viuda. The table-land of this knot 

 of mountains appears in the Pambas de Bombon to be more 

 than 1800 toises above the level of the ocean. From this 

 point, on the north of the parallel of Huanuco, (lat. 11) 

 the Andes are divided into three chains : the first, and most 

 eastern, rises between Pozuzu and Muna, between the Rio 

 Huallaga, and the Bio Pachitea, a tributary of the Ucayali; 

 the second, or central, is between the Huallaga, and the 

 Upper Maranon ; the third, or western, between the Upper 

 Maranon and the coast of Truxillo and Payta. The eastern 

 chain is a small lateral branch which lowers into a range of 

 hills: its direction is first N.N.E., bordering the Pampas 

 del Sacramento, afterwards it turns W.N.W., where it is 

 broken by the Bio Huallaga, in the Pongo, above the con- 

 fluence of Chipurana, and then it loses itself in latitude 6^, 

 on the north-west of Lamas. A transversal ridge seems to 

 connect it with the central chain, south of Paramo de Pis- 

 coguanuna (or Piscuaguna), west of Chachapoyas. The 

 intermediary or central chain stretches from the knot of 

 Pasco and Huanuco, towards N.N.W., between Xican and 

 Chicoplaya, Huacurachuco and the sources of the Bio Mon- 

 zan, between Pataz and Pajatan, Caxamarquilla and Moyo- 

 bamba. It widens greatly in the parallel of Chachapoyas, 

 and forms a mountainous territory, traversed by deep and 

 extremely hot vallies. On the north of the Paramo de 

 Piscoguanuna (lat. 6), the central chain throws two branches 

 in the direction of La Yellaca and San Borja. We shall 

 soon see that this latter branch forms, below the Bio Neva 

 a tributary stream of the Amazon, the rocks that border the 

 famous Pongo de Manseriche. In this zone, where North 

 Peru approximates to the confines of New Grenada in lat. 



