38 TRAVELS AMONGST THE GREAT ANDES, chap. ii. 



tell from his own writings where he actually went.^ He does 

 not give courses, or bearings, or such indications as enable one 

 to identify with certainty the positions to which he refers. He 

 states that upon June 23, 1802, he reached the height of 



19,286 feet by 1 p.m., and that this was greater than he ^' had 

 dared hope for. In many places the ridge was not wider than 



1 See Vue^ dam les Cordilleres, pp. 104-7; Aspects of Nature; Eleinere 

 Schriften; liecueil d' Observations Astrojtomiques, etc. etc. I think it better to 

 adopt aJ authoritative the account which is given in Karl Bruhns' Life of 

 Humboldt (8vo, Lond., 1873, vol. 1, pp. 311-315) than to attempt to construct a 

 narrative from these diverse relations. His biographer must be assumed to be 

 fully acquainted with all that has been written on the subject. 



