800 
THE COEDIELEKA OE CHILE, 
^anch (the Cordillera de Chiriguanaes, de los Sauces, and 
liiraearees) extend regularly from west to east; their east- 
ern declmity* IS very rapid, and their loftiest summits are 
not in the centre, but in the northern part of the group 
The principal CordUlera of Chile and Fpper Peru is for 
the first time, ramified very distinctly into two branches, in 
we group of Porco and Potosi, between lat. 19° and 20°. 
ihese two branches comprehend the table-Iand extending 
Snt n (lat- 19r-15^) and in which i1 
situated the small mountain lake of Paria, the Desaguadero, 
and the great Laguna ot Titicaca or Chucuito, of which the 
western part bears the name of Vinamarca. To afford an idea 
of the colossal dimensions of the Andes, I may here observe 
tliat the surface ot the lake of Titicaca alone (418 square 
sea leagues) is twenty times greater than that of the Lake 
ot Geneva, and twice the perage extent of a department of 
i ranee On the banks of this lake, near Tiahuanacii, and 
111 the high plains of Callao, ruins are found which bear 
m ideiice ol a state of civilization anterior to that which the 
Peruvians assign to the reign of the Inea Manco Caiiac. 
The eastern CordiUera, that of La Paz, Palca, Aiicunia, and 
Pelec liiico, join north-west of Apolobamba, the western 
Cordillera, wliicli is the most extensive of the whole chain of 
the Aiiiks, between the parallels 14° and 15°. The imperial 
city ot Cuzco IS situated near the eastern extremity of this 
knot, which comprehends, in an area of 3000 square leamies, 
Lie mountaiiis of Vilcanota, Carabaya, Abancai, Huando. 
Pariiiacochas, and Andahiiaylas. Though here, as in general, 
in every considerable widening of the Cordillera, the grouped 
summits do not tollow the principal axis in uniform and 
parallel directions, a, phenomenon observable in the general 
disposition of the chain of the Andes, from lat. 18°, is well 
worthy the attention of geologists. The whole mass of the 
Cordilleras ot Chile and Upper Peru, from the Straits of 
r concerning the Sierra de Cochabamba, I am 
indebted to the manuscripts of my countryman, the celebrated botanist 
°°'>Srcgation of the Escurial, 
Father Cisneros, kindly commmncated to me at Lima. Mr. Haenke, 
after liaving followed the expedition of Alexander Mahispina, settled at 
Cochabamba, in 1,98. A part of the immense herbal of this botanist is 
now at rrague. 
