276 ASCENT OF THE UIO MACiUALEXA. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



Brief Account of the Journey from Carthagena to Quito 

 and 3Iexico. 



Ascent of the Rio Magdalena — Santa Fe de Bogota — Cataract of 

 Tequendama — Natural Bridges of Icononzo — Passage of Quin- 

 diu — Cargueros — Popayan — Quito — Cotopaxi and Cliiniborazo — 

 Route from Quito to Lima — Guayaquil — Mexico — Guanaxuato — 

 Volcano of Jorullo — Pyramid of Clioluia. 



CiiAP.XXiIl. It has been already stated that Humboldt, previously to 

 Proposed leaving Paris, had promised Baudin, that should his 

 junction with projected expedition to the southern hemisphere ever 

 ^^ ^^' take place, he would endeavour to join it ; and also that 

 information received by him at Cuba had induced him 

 to relinquish plans subsequently formed, and re-embark 

 for the continent of South America, with the view of 

 proceeding to Guayaquil or Lima, where he expected to 

 . meet the navigators. Accordingly he went to Cartha- 



gena, where he learned that the season was too far 

 advanced for sailing from Panama to Guayaquil. Giving 

 up, therefore, his intention of crossing the isthmus of 

 Panama, he passed some days in the forests of Turbaco, 

 and afterwards made preparations for ascending the Rio 

 ^Magdalena. 

 Kio Magda- This river, from its sources near the equator, flows 

 """■ almost directly north. " Nature," says a travelitr who 



sailed up it in 1823, "seems to have designedly dug the 

 ])cd of tiic Magdalena in the midst of the cordilleras of 

 Colombia, to form a canal of communication between 



