m 
BARBJiNNESS OE THE I.l AND 
disappear but very slowly by fire and tbe axe, wlien Ihr 
trunks of trees arc from eight to ten feet in diameter ; 
when in faUlng they rest one upon another, and the wood, 
moistened by almost continual rains, is excessively hard. 
The planters Avho inhabit the Llanos or Pampas, do not 
generally admit the possibility of subjecting the soil to cul- 
tivation ; it is a problem not yet solved. Most of the sa- 
vaimahs of Venezuela have not the same advantage as those 
of North America. The latter are ti-aversed longitudinally 
by three great rivers, the Missouri, the Arkansas, and the 
lied Eiver of Naehitoches ; the savannahs of Araura, Cala- 
bozo, and Pao, are crossed in a transverse direction only by 
the tributary streams of the Orinoco, the most westerly of 
which (the Cari, the Pao, the Acaru, and the Manapire) 
have very little water in the season of drought. These 
streams scarcely flow at all toward the north ; so that in 
tlie centre of the Llanos, there remain vast tracts ot land 
called iancos and mesas* frightfully parched. Tlie eastern 
parts, fertilized by the Portuguesa, tlie Masparro, and the 
Orivante, and by the tributary streams of those three rivers, 
are most susceptible of cultivation. The soil is sand mixed 
with clay, covering a bed of quiirtz pebbles. The vegetable 
mould, the principal source of the nutrition of plants, is 
everywhere extremely thin. It is scarcely augmented by 
the fall of the leaves, which, in the forests of the torrid 
zone, is less periodically regular than in temperate climates. 
During thousands of years the Llanos have been destitute 
of trees and brushwood; a few scattered palms in the 
savannah add little to that hydruret of carbon, that extractive 
matter, which, according to the experiments of Saussure, 
Davy, and Bracouiiot, gives fertility to the soil. The socia- 
plants, which almost exclusively predominate in the stepj)es, 
are monocotyledons ; and it is known how much grasses im* 
poverish the soil into which their fibrous roots penetrate. 
This action of the killingias, paspalums, and cenchri, which 
form the turf, is everywhere the same ; but where the rock 
is ready to pierce the earth, this varies according as it rests 
• The Spanish words banco and mesa signify literally ‘ bench ’ and 
‘ table.' In the Llanos of South America, little elevations rising slightly 
above the general elevation of the plain are called baneot and )«<»*»» 
from their supposed resemblance to benches and tablet. 
