ISLAlfD OP MAEGUEEITA. 
333 
northern side unquestionably presents the vestiges of the 
northern chain of Venezuela, that is, ot the Montana de 
Paria (the ‘ Paradise’ of Christopher Colmnhus), tlie penin- 
sula of Arava, and the Silk of Caracas. The observations 
of latitude I made at the Villa de Cura (10 2 '17 ), the 
farm of Cocollar (10° 9' 37"), and the convent of Caripe 
10° 10' 11"), compared with the more anciently knowi: 
position of the south coast of Trinidad (kit. 10° t)')>P’'0'' ® 
that the southern chain, south of the basins of Valencia and 
of Tuy* aud of the gulfs of Cariaco and Paria, is still more 
uniform in the direction Irom west to east than the northern 
chain from Porto Cabello to Punta Galera. 1^ 
impOTtaut to know the southern limit ot the littoral Cor- 
dillera of Venezuela, because it determines the parallel at 
which the Llanos or the savannahs of Caracas, Parcelona 
aud Cumana begin. On some well-known maps, we find 
erroneously marked between the meridians of Caracas and 
Cumana, two Cordilleras stretching from north to south, as 
far as latitude 8f°, under the names of Cerros de Alta 
Gracia, and del Bergantin, thus describing as mountainous 
a territory of 25 leagues broad, where we should seek in 
vain a hillock of a few feet iu height. 
Turning to the island of Margiierita, composed, hke the 
peninsula of Araya, of micaceous slate, and anciently 
with that peninsula by the INlorro de Chacopata and the 
islands of Coche and Cubagiia, we seem to recognize in the 
two mouut.ainous groups of Maeauao and La Vega de ban 
Juan, traces of a third coast-chaiu ot the Cordillera ot 
Venezuela. Do these two groiqis ot Marguenta, ot whic.i 
the most westerly is above 000 toises high belong to a sub- 
marine chain stretching by the isle of Tortuga, toWs 
the Sierra de Santa Lucia de Coro, on the parallel ot 11 
Must we admit, that in lat. llF and 12 J°, a fourth chain, 
the most northerly of all, formerly stretched out in the 
direction of the island of Hennanos, by Blanquilla Los 
Roques, Orchila, Aves, Bueu Ayre, Cura 9 ao, and Uiuba, 
* Tlie bottom of the first of these four basins bounded by parallel 
chains, is from 230 to 460 toises above, and that ol the 
30 to 40 toises below the present sea-level. Hot spnag Unrtom of the 
bottom of the gulf of the basin of Cariaeo, as from the bottom of the 
basin of Valencia on the continent. 
