112 
SALI J)£fOSH'S. 
masses of native alum, witli a coiichoidal or iinperfectij 
lamellar fracture. "VVe were led to hope that we should 
find the mine of alum {mina de alitn) m the slaty cordil* 
lera of Maniquarez, and so new a geological phenomenon 
was calculated to rivet our attention. The priest Juan 
Gonzales, and the treasurer, Don Manuel Navarete, who 
had been useful to us from our first arrival on this coast, 
accompanied us in our little excursion. "We disembarked 
near Cape Caney, and again visited the ancient saltpit 
(wliich is converted into a lake by tlie irrujition of the sea), 
the fine ruins of the castle of Araya, and the calcareous 
mountain of the Barigon, which, from its steepness on the 
nestcni side is somewhat difficult of access. Aluriatiferous 
clay mixed with bitumen and lenticular gypsum, and some- 
times passing to a darkish brown clay, devoid of salt, is a 
formation widely spread through this peninsula, in the 
island of Margareta, and on the opposite continent, near the 
castle of San Antonio de Cumana. Probably the existence of 
this formation has contributed to produce those ruptures and 
rents in the ground, which strike the eye of the geologist 
when he stands on one of the eminences of the peninsula of 
Araya. The cordillera of this peninsula, composed of mica- 
slate and clay-slatc, is separated on the north from the chain 
of mountains of the island of Margareta, (which are of a 
similar composition,) by the channel of Cubagua; and on the 
south it is separated from the loft)'' calcareous chain of the 
continent, by the gulf of Cariaco. The whole intermediate 
•space appears to have been heretofore filled with muriatife- 
rous clay ; and no doubt the continual erosions of the ocean 
have removed this formation, and converted the plain, first 
into lakes, then into gulfs, and finally into navigable channels, 
'f he account of what has passed in the most modern times at 
tlie foot of the castle of Araya, the irruption of the sea into 
the ancient saltpit, the formation of the laguna de Chacopata, 
and a lake, four leagues in length, which cuts the island 
of Afargareta nearly into two parts, afford evident proofs 
of these successive erosions. In tlie singular configuration 
of the coasts in the Alorro of Chacopata; in the little 
islands of the Caribbees, the Lobos and Tunal; in the 
great island of Coche, and the capes of Carnero and Man- 
gliers ; there still seem to be apparent the remains of an 
