AUiaVAL AT NKAV DAKCKI.ONA. 249 



the coast and from the missions, and lived in the Llanos CHAP.XX. 

 in a manner similar to that of the Bedouin Arabs. ,. . — 

 Those vast i^lains, Humboldt thinks, can hardly ever be vohbln. 

 subjected to cultivation ; although he is persuaded that 

 in the lapse of ages, if placed under a government 

 favourable to industry, they will lose much of the wild 

 aspect which they have hitherto retained. 



After travelling three days they began to perceive the Mountains 

 chain of the mountains of Cumana, which separates the """"'"■ 

 Llanos from the coast of the Caribbean Sea. It ap- 

 peared at first like a fog-bank, which by degrees con- 

 densed, assumed a bluish tint, and became bounded by 

 sinuous outlines. Although the Llanos of Venezuela 

 are bordered on the south by granitic mountains exhib- 

 iting in their broken summits traces of violent convul- 

 sions, no blocks were found scattered upon them. The 

 same remark is to be made in regard to the other 

 great plains of South America. These circumstances, 

 as Humboldt remarks, seem to prove that the granitic 

 masses scattered over the sandy plains of the Baltic are 

 a local phenomenon, and must have originated in some 

 great convulsion which took place in the northern 

 regions of Europe. 



On the 2.3d July they arrived at the town of New KewBarca- 

 Barcelona, less fatigued by the hetit to which they had '"^'^ 

 been so long accustomed, than harassed by the sand- 

 wind, that causes painful chaps in the skin. They were 

 kindly received by a wealthy merchant of French ex- 

 traction, Don Pedro Lavie. This town was founded in 

 1(337, and in 1800 contained more than 1G,000 inhabi- 

 tants. The climate is not so hot as that of Cumana, 

 but very damp, and in the rainy season rather unhealthy. 

 M. Bonpland had by this time regained his strength and 

 activity, but his companion suffered more at Barcelona 

 than he had done at Angostura. One of those extra- 

 ordinary tropical rains, during which drops of enormous 

 size fall at sunset, had produced uneasy sensations that 

 seemed to threaten an attack of typhus, — a disease then 

 prevalent on the coast. They remained nearly a month 



