324 TRAVELS A3I0NGST THE GREAT ANDES, chap, xviir. 



valleys^ vallons, dells and dales, backed by the Ocean/ rising above 

 the haze which obscured the flat coast land. 



Now we turned back to the north, and zigzagged to and fro to 

 ease the ascent, getting into the direct rays of the sun, which was 

 already more than fifty degrees high. The clouds from Cotopaxi 

 were bearing down upon Chimborazo, seeming to rise higher and 

 yet higher in the sky, although they were actually descending. 

 For a full hour we saw the immense column still rising from the 

 crater, and then the clouds which were drifting towards us shut 

 it out. 



When they commenced to intervene between the sun and our- 

 selves the effects which were produced were truly amazing. We 

 saw a green sun, and smears of colour something like verdigris 

 green high up in the sky, which changed to equally extreme blood- 

 reds, or to coarse brick-reds, and then passed in an instant to the 

 colour of tarnished copper, or shining brass. No words can convey 

 the faintest idea of the impressive appearance of these strange 

 colours in the sky — seen one moment and gone the next — re- 

 sembling nothing to which they can properly be compared, and 

 surpassing in vivid intensity the wildest effects of the most 

 gorgeous sunsets. 



The terms that I have employed to designate the colours which 

 were seen are both inadequate and inexact. Their most striking 

 features were their extraordinary strength, their extreme coarseness, 

 and their dissimilarity from any tints or tones ever seen in the 

 sky, even during sunrises or sunsets of exceptional brilliancy. 

 They were unlike colours for which there are recognized terms. 

 They commenced to be seen when the clouds began to pass between 

 the sun and ourselves, and were not seen previously. The changes 

 from one hue to another had obvious connection with the varying 

 densities of the clouds that passed ; which were sometimes thick 

 and sometimes light. No colours were seen when they moved 

 overhead, and surrounded us on all sides. 



^ The part seen was probably distant 200 or more miles. 



