TRINIDAD : THEN AND NOW. 



229 



La Brea is a species distinct from the common anna 

 of the West Indies." 



M At length you reach the place on which 

 no hut can be erected ; the whole lagoon is 

 open before you. It presents a most extraordi- 

 nary spectacle — one which words cannot describe 

 and which the pencil has failed to delineate. This 

 lake is about half a geographical league in circum- 

 ference ; it is surrounded on all sides by dark woods, 

 save towards the sea ; the surface seems perfectly 

 black during the rainy season, but in the dry weather 

 it has a partial greyish hue ; it appears as though 

 billions of tons of pitch had boiled up from the earth, 

 from the effects of an immense subterranean fire 

 which had been extinguished and left the asphaltum 

 to cool in enormous bubbles." 



66 It is time that I conducted my readers towards 

 the more active part of the lagoon. In order to do 

 this we must approach from the side nearest to the 

 sea. Here we encounter streams of petroleum slowly 

 but perceptibly flowing. Let us advance with cau- 

 tion ; as we sink ankle deep at each step ; let us 

 pause, there would be danger dn advancing further ; 

 behold these fountains which supply all these rills of 

 petroleum ; no man can venture near, that is the 

 capital of the Demon of the lake Asphaltum, the 

 Phlegethon of this subterranean Tartarus." 



Mr. Joseph goes on to describe many other 

 things which show that either things were very dif- 

 ferent in his day or that he had a considerable poetic 

 imagination. The relation of them here would make 



