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THE ALPS AND THE CORDILLERA. 



Italy, and carry far down into the clime of the vine and 

 chestnut, the debris of the inhospitable regions of bare 

 rock and snow. 



But as to those details, which you would take as chiefly 

 characteristic of either chain, no similarity whatever can 

 be established. 



In the limestone, slate, and granitic ranges of the Alps, 

 beauty of outline is far from being confined to any single 

 ridge. It is an attribute of the secondary, as well as the 

 most elevated; of the parallel chains, as well as of the 

 diverging mountains, which, like ribs, start out from the 

 great back bone of the continent, and sink gradually to 

 the level of the plains on either hand. Piled, range be- 

 hind range, with deep vales between — with numerous 

 lakes, and clothed up to the very limit of eternal snow, 

 with green or forested slopes — they are eminently pic- 

 turesque ; and the gentle luxuriance of the lower valleys 

 contrasts felicitously w ith the precipitous rocks and masses 

 of snow which occupy the higher regions. The scale 

 and the structure of the Alps permit the eye to command, 

 in almost every situation, the whole of their varied detail. 

 The enormous extent of the glaciers on the upper plains 

 and acclivities, and the peculiar manner in which they 

 descend towards the valleys, are mainly characteristic of 

 these mountains. 



Now as to general outline, both from what I have seen 

 and have heard with regard to other parts of the Andes, 

 that of the great porphyritic chains of the Cordillera can 

 hardly be said to be generally picturesque. It is scarcely 

 broken enough ; its details are too vast. One enormous 

 wall of mountains rises behind another, each buttressing 

 a broad step of table land, but in general the interval be- 

 tween them is far too great for the eye to command 

 more than one at a time. Here and there, from the 

 general level of the undulating mountain ridge, rises a 

 tremendous cone, with a breadth of base, and an even 

 smoothness of outline, which, at the same time that they 

 proclaim its origin, and add to its sublimity, take from its 

 picturesque beauty. The summit bears its mantle of 

 snow ; but compared with the mass, it is but a cap — not 



