VIEW EROM THE SUMMIT. 
47 
striking down into it. Disappointed, however, in this ex- 
pectation, I continued onwards to the mountain, which I 
I’eached just before the sun set. Indeed, he was barely vi- 
sible when I gained its summit ; but my eyes, from expo- 
sure to his glare, became so weak, my face was so blistered, 
and my lips cracked in so many places, that I was unable 
to look towards the west, and was actually obliged to sit 
down behind a rock until he had set. 
Perhaps no time is so favourable for a view along the 
horizon as the sunset hour ; and here, at an elevation of 
from five to six hundred feet above the plain, the visible 
line of it could not have been less than from thirty-five to 
forty-five miles. The hill upon which I stood was broken 
into two points ; the one was a bold rocky elevation ; the 
other had its rear face also perpendicular, but gradually de- 
clined to the north, and at a distance of from four to five 
miles was lost in an extensive and open plain in that direc- 
tion. In the S. E. quarter, two wooded bills were visible, 
which before had appeared to be nothing more than swells 
in the general level of the country. A small hill, similar to 
the above, bore N. E. by compass ; and again, to the west, 
a more considerable mountain than that I had ascended, 
and evidently much higher, reflected the last beams of the 
sun as he sunk behind them. I looked, however, in vain 
for water. I could not trace either the windings of a stream, 
or the course of a mountain torrent; and, as we had passed 
a swamp about a mile from the hill, we descended to it for 
the night, during which we were grievously tormented by 
the mosquitoes. 
