178 FALL OF TEQUENDAMA. 



The banks on each side are covered with 

 trees. On a level with the bed of the river, 

 and only at fifty yards distance from it, the 

 spectator gazes with surprise and admira- 

 tion on the vast and accumulating body of 

 water, which is precipitated with violence 

 down a perpendicular rock, at two bounds, 

 to the immense depth of six hundred and 

 fifty feet, into a dark unfathomable abyss; 

 whence it issues impetuously over a stony 

 bed, amidst the windings of the rock, and 

 pursues its track by a precipitate descent un- 

 til it is lost in the waters of the great river 

 Magdalena, with whose stream it mingles. 

 When this prodigious body of water issues 

 from the chasm, it forms an arch, broad and 

 brilliant in appearance ; a little farther down 

 it resembles a white fleece, and as it des- 

 cends still lower, it darts forth myriads of 

 fanciful shapes, more like fireworks than 

 any thing else to which I can compare them. 

 The evaporation is excessively great and 



