MOUNTAIN TT'.OTITATIO'N'. 
203 
which the Cordillera appeared before the disk of the rising 
sun had reached the horizon. The tint of the summits is of 
a deeper blue, their outline is more strongly marked, and 
their masses are more detached, as long as the transparency 
of the air is undisturbed by the vapours, which, after accu- 
mulating during the night in the valleys, rise in proportion 
as the atmosphere acquires warmth. 
At the hospital of the Divina Pastora the path turns to 
north-east, and stretches for two leagues over a soil without 
trees, and formerly levelled by the waters. We there found 
not only cactuses, tufts of cistus-leaved tribal us, and the beau- 
tiful purple euphorbia,* but also the avicennia, the allioniii, 
the sesuviuro, the tbalinum, and most of the portulaeeous 
plants which grow on the banks of the gulf of Cariaco. This 
geographical distribution of plants appears to designate the 
limits of the ancient coast, anil to prove that the hills along 
the southern side of which we were passing, formed hereto- 
fore a small island, separated from the continent by an arm 
of the sea. 
After walking two hours, we arrived at the foot of the 
high chain of the interior mountains, which stretches from 
east to west ; from the Brigantine to the Cerro de San 
Lorenzo. There, new rocks appear, and with them another 
aspect of vegetation. Every object assumes a more majestic 
and picturesque character; the soil, watered by spriugs, 
is furrowed in every direction ; trees of gigantic height, 
covered with lianas, rise from the ravines ; their hark, black 
and burnt by the double action of the light and the oxygen 
of the atmosphere, contrasts with the fresh verdure of the 
pothos and dracontium, the tough and shining leaves of 
which are sometimes several feet long. The parasite mono- 
cotyledons take between the tropics the place of the moss 
and lichens of our northern zone. As we advanced, the 
forms and grouping of the rocks reminded us of Switzerland 
and the Tyrol. The heliconia, eostus, maranta, and other 
plants of the family of the balisiers (Caima indiea), which 
near the coasts vegetate only in damp and low places, 
flourish in the American Alps at considerable height. Thus, 
by a singular similitude, in the torrid zone, under the in- 
fluence of an atmosphere continually loaded with vapours 
* EuohoiMa tithymaloides. 
