8 NOTES ON BllAZIL. 



From the circumstance of there being few or no hot springs about 

 the mountain, I should conceive that the volcano, though standing so 

 near to it, has no communication with the sea. Such springs may be 

 formed, not only by chemical processes, which are continually going on 

 in the bowels of the earth, but also by the moisture which the mountain 

 imbibes passing near to the chimney, and tliereby becoming heated 

 before it break out lower down in the form of fountains. 



In 1816, I had the pleasure again of visiting several neighbouring 

 islands, and was pleased to find that a larger quantity of corn had been 

 sown than formerly, and that the cultivation of tlie vine had propor- 

 tionably decreased. By those who admire a finished landscape this 

 would be regretted, but I am one who had rather smile with Ceres than 

 laugh with Bacchus. Madeira, Teneriflfe, and Palma, were the most 

 improved ; in Gomera and Ferro little alteration was observed. 



The coast of Africa presents to contemplation the Zaara, perhaps 

 the most extensive desert on the globe. It consists of inadhesive sands, 

 driven about by the winds, chiefly the N. E. by which it is carried, in 

 the form of red dust, to a most surprising distance. I once saw the sails 

 and deck of a vessel covered with it, when four hundred miles from the 

 coast, and have heard of the same phenomenon being remarked at a far 

 greater distance. This moving expanse of sand was probably, at some 

 anterior period, a large inland shallow sea, communicating with the 

 Mediterranean by the Syrtes, and with the Indian Ocean by the Arabian 

 Gulph. This conjecture may appear more reasonable, perhaps, when the 

 coast about Rio Grande do Sul, and some other parts of the American 

 continent, shall have been described. 



Directly off this part of the African coast is found also a very 

 singular part of the ocean ; the Mar Saragossa, the green or weedy sea. 

 It extends from eleven to thirty -five degrees of north latitude, and from 

 thirty degrees of longitude to a distance westward whicli I am unac- 

 quainted with. The ocean here is covered by nodules of sea-weed, 

 from three to eighteen inches diameter, somewhat resembling in form 

 a cauliflower, when stripped of its leaves. They float lightly upon 



