20 CRUISE OF THE BARRERA 



With clanging of bells, shriek of Klaxon, scatter- 

 ing of children and domestic animals, our chauffeur 

 fairly shot out of Pinar, taking the Vifiales road 

 with a rush that made us beg for mercy. Arrived 

 at "Kilometer 14" we stopped to explore a mogote, 

 the isolated remnant of a limestone sierra, which, 

 with two or three smaller mogotes near by are the 

 last surviving portions of a vanished range of 

 mountains. 



As we shall have more to say of mogotes and 

 their importance to us in our work, it would be 

 well to explain here just what they are, and why 

 we were always eager to visit them. The Spanish 

 language is rich in nomenclature of all that per- 

 tains to topographical features. The word mogote 

 (only used in western Cuba) indicates a limestone 

 elevation more or less isolated from a main range 

 of mountains and standing alone or at least semi- 

 detached. The word loma is applied to a hill 

 of rounded smooth outline which is generally 

 composed of slate or sandstone shales along with 

 the clays and sandy soil resulting from the dis- 

 integration of those classes of rocks. The different 

 origins of these two types of elevations give to each 

 a very characteristic appearance. The mogote is 



