232 SOUTH AMEEICA— THE ANDES EEGIONS. 



The Ecuadorean Coast Ranges. 



The pass followed by the road from Guayaquil to Chimborazo attains a height 

 of 10,420 feet where it crosses this " Pacific Range of Ecuador," as Whymper 

 calls it, that is, Wolf's " Cordillera of Chirabo." In its culminating peak, 

 Purain, this range reaches an altitude of 11,500 feet; but farther on the crest 

 falls rapidly, terminating in the steep cliff on the banks of the Rio Chimbo, which 

 reaches the coast at Guayaquil Bay. 



East of tbe Rio Daule, which joins the Chimbo in the Guayaquil estuary, 

 a few small coast ranges and groups attain altitudes of 1,000 or 2,000 feet. 

 The so-called Cordillera de Colonche, highest of these ridges, exceeds 2,450 

 feet, and ramifies eastwards in the Cordillera de Chongon, which projects as 

 far as the Rio Guayas. The system is even continued beyond the estuary 

 by a rocky islet, and some eminences rising just above Guayaquil, on the left 

 bank of the Chimbo. Chandiiy, southernmost member of this group, although 

 only 1,000 feet high, is lofty enough to intercept the southern breezes, and 

 deflect them towards Guayaquil, where they are locally known as the Chanduy 

 winds. 



Chimborazo — Carihuairazo — Table of Altitudes. 



In Ecuador the last snowy peak is Chimborazo, that is, the " Chimbo Snows," 

 so named from the western valley, whence the ascent is made to its glaciers. 

 On the east side the corresponding name was Urcu-Razu (" Snowmount "), 

 already mentioned under a slightly different form by Cieza de Leon. 



This giant of the Ecuadorean Andes develops its rounded crest above a 

 rugged mountain mass flanked by two superb buttresses, the Igualata volcano on 

 the east, and on the north the extinct Carihuairazo, often called Chimborazo 

 Hembra, the " "Woman," as if regarded by the popular fancy as the mate of its 

 taller neighbour. Yet according to a somewhat doubtful tradition, Carihuairazo 

 exceeded Chimborazo in altitude down to the end of the sixteenth century, when 

 its summit collapsed during an earthquake, leaving the two fragments now 

 covered with snow. 



But whatever truth may be veiled by this legend, Chimborazo at present 

 overtops Carihuairazo by about 5,000 feet. It was undoubtedly the scene of 

 former eruptions, although no reference is made to them by the chroniclers, or 

 even by any local traditions. The crater, if it still exists, is entirely buried 

 beneath the deep snows and the glaciers radiating from the summit. Even the 

 lava-streams that must have once flowed down its flanks can no longer be 

 detected, while the original regularity of the cone has been efi"aced by tbe 

 tremendous cataclysm which carried off a portion of the mountain, leaving 

 those enormous and inaccessible walls which now rise above the lower ice-clifïs. 



Boussingault's hypothesis, that the entire mass of fractured trachytes was 

 bodily displaced, has not yet been confirmed by the observations of subsequent 

 explorers. The walls still standing are formed by innumerable strata of diverse 



