TOPOGRAPHY OF COLOMBIA. 209 



Buenaventura, on an islet at the eastern extremity of a long inlet south of the 

 Hio San Juan, attracts to its port about three-fourths of all the foreign trade of 

 the Cauca basin. The deep and well-sheltered bight had been discovered in 1530 

 by Pascual de Andagoya, who ascended the Rio Dagua, which here reaches the 

 coast, and passed thence over the Cordillera to the interior. But nothing was to 

 be seen on the spot but a few fishermen's huts till the year 1821, when the city 

 of Buenaventura was officially founded. On the mainland the suburb of Puehlo 

 Nuero stands on the banks of a shallow estuary facing the north side of the 

 island. 



Although the busiest seaport on the Pacific coast of Colombia, Buenaventura 

 has but a small foreign trade compared with that of Barranquilla. But a great 

 development is expected on the completion of the railway crossing the Cordilleras 

 down to the Cauca valley. 



South of Buenaventura follow a few little ports, such as Micai, Timbiqui, and 

 Isquande, over against the seven-peaked island of Gorgona, with La Gorgonita at 

 its southern extremity. Most of the territory between this point and the 

 Ecuador frontier is comprised within the basin of the Patia, which is better 

 peopled than any other fluvial valleys draining to the Pacific. 



Here the breezy uplands, relatively cold but healthy, are occupied by 

 Almaguer, Bolimr, and several other towns and villages, whose inhabitants 

 carefully avoid the low-lying coastlands. The negroes and half-castes alone 

 are able to resist the debilitating climate of these fertile but oppressively hot 

 districts, which yield abundant crops of the finest tobacco and other agricultural 

 produce. In the El Castigo (Rosario) district the cacao plantations, covering a 

 space of about 100 acres, and dating from the beginning of the present century, 

 contain some trees 130 feet high, whose fruit still retains its full flavour. Some 

 of the slopes are clothed with trees matted together by the coils of the vanilla 

 climber, whose powerful aroma is wafted on the breeze to distances of many 

 leagues round about. 



TUQUERRKS PaSTO TuMACO IpiALES. 



Towards the Ecuador frontier the plateau is occupied by the two important 

 towns of Taquerres and Pasto, which give their names to the neighbouring 

 volcanoes, and which lie, one to the west, the other to the east, of the Guaitara 

 affluent of the Patia. Tuquerres, so named from an extinct Indian tribe, stands 

 at an altitude of 10,035 feet, or 100 feet higher than Mucuchies, in Venezuela. 

 From its sloping terrace a marvellous view is commanded of the surrounding 

 volcanoes, of the plateaux above which they rise, and of the gorges by which their 

 flanks are furrowed. 



Pasto, although less elevated, stands at about the same height as Bogota, 



and enjoys a similar climate. This city, lying about midway between Quito and 



Popayan, replaced in 1539 the settlement of El Madrigal, founded two years 



previously by Belalcazar. Formerly included in the diocese of Quito, and 



15 



