24 TRAVELS A310NGST THE GREAT ANDES, chap. ii. 



he says, ^'^ neither in Quito,^ nor in Mexico, resembling the 

 Swiss glaciers " ; and he quotes a confirmatory passage from 

 Boussingault, in which the latter says that he is only acquainted 

 with one glacier in Ecuador, upon the mountain Tunguragua 

 — ^'c^est le seul glacier que j'aie vu en Amerique entre les 

 tropiques." Yet I saw Chimborazo crowned by glacier, and 

 streaming with glaciers. They departed in all directions from 

 a plateau on the top, almost covering the mountain.^ 



The question then arose, AYhich of these two summits is the 

 higher, and the real top of Chimborazo ? and in the discussion 

 that followed it appeared that we all inclined to the opinion 

 that the right - hand or more eastern and more distant one, 

 although apparently lower, was actually loftier than the left- 

 hand or more westerly one. Upon bringing the theodolite to 

 bear upon it, I found that it (the eastern summit) was depressed 

 2' 30" below the other. 



We then debated the manner of approach to the eastern 

 summit. Assuming it to be the higher of the two, how was 

 it to be attained ? The natural course would have been from 

 the south-east.^ This side of the mountain, however, was- never 

 perfectly free from clouds. It was steep, and so far as we 

 could see, it was .almost completely covered by glacier. We 

 could distinguish multitudes of crevasses — the essential and 

 distinctive feature of glaciers ; and great schrunds which are the 

 outward and visible signs of the dislocation of these icy masses 

 in their passage across unusually irregular ground. Over these 



1 In this passage, Humboldt means the viceroyalty of Quito (embracing the 

 whole of Ecuador), not the City of Quito. I give the passage at length in Chapter 

 XIX. 



2 The view facing p. 24 is from a photograph which was taken a few days 

 later. For the purposes of our discussion I sketched the mountain. 



' The reader will be able to follow me upon the accompanying plate. The tambo 

 of Tortorillas lies to the right, beyond the range of the engraving. The Great 

 Arenal is behind the distant ridge, which stretches from one side to the other. 

 The lowest part seen of Chimborazo is more than 16,000 feet above the sea. 



