OF SANTO DOMINGO. 



131 



The same causes that prevented us from obtainmg more details in regard to the 

 little corner lying between Savaneta and the frontier also debarred us fi-om visiting 

 the south side of the range about and to the west of San J uan. Kepeated eflbrts 

 were made to cross the range south fi om Savaneta or from San Jose de las Matas by 

 way of the head of the Bao River, but our friends the militaiy chiefs in the Cibao, 

 not less than the civil authorities, combined to prevent what they considered so 

 hazardous an undertaking. Commandantes, Governor, and Vice-President united 

 in such a thorough course of " masterly inactivity " that all our efforts to procure 

 guides and escort were unavailing, and we were reluctantly obliged to abandon the 

 project and content ourselves with a section no farther west than the Constanza Pass. 

 This is the more to be regretted because, while there are three broad strips of intrusive 

 rocks further west which unite in the great mass around the Pico del Yaqui, and 

 another intrusion scarcely less great east of the route, there is so little encountered 

 on the pass that it leads us to believe that equally unexpected changes might take 

 place to the south of where our more western explorations extended. 



Although Jarabacoa is underlaid by slates, the margin of the syenites of Humu- 

 imcu is just back of the toAvn in the bottom of the pretty little valley in which the 

 town is built. The slates are highly uptilted, dipping" noi'thward at high angles, and 

 often standing vertically. They are nearly in every case more or less talcose, though 

 beds of sandstone occur occasionally. The Jimenoa River empties into the Yaqui 

 half a dozen miles below the town, the two streams coming together in such a manner 

 that it seems as if the former were the main river and the upper part of the latter the 

 tributary. The stream, after the confluence of the two, continues in the direction that 

 the Jimenoa was flowing, while the Yaqui enters at an angle of perhaps 60°. On 

 the bluff facing the entrance of the latter there is a fine exposure of highly metamorphic 

 slates containing some pyrites. The decomposition of the mineral produces the 

 efflorescence of large quantities of a greenish and yellowish alum, which is periodi- 

 cally collected by the people of the vicinity and sold to the apothecaries of Santiago 

 and Puerto Plata. This natural laboratory is the only one of the kind I have seen 

 in the country. The little basin of Jai'abacoa is in some parts flat, though in greater 

 part made up of low rolling ground. Directly behind rises the steep face of the hills, 

 and the dark round knob of the Mogote frowns down directly over the village. A mile 

 out of the town the trail crosses the River Baguati, and immediately begins to ascend 

 the hill. The climb is a very steep one and about three miles long in all, zig-zaging 

 up the face of a hill, the path sometimes cut into ste})S by the feet of the animals. 

 Prom the top of this spur it winds, with very little change of level, back of the Loma 



