THE LAGUNA GRANDE. 
209 
It has received the name of the Imposible, because it is 
believed that, in the case of hostile invasion, this ridge of 
mountains would be inaccessible to the enemy, and would 
offer an asylum to the inhabitants of Cumana. We reached 
the top a little before sunset, and I had scarcely time to 
take a few horary angles, to determine the longitude of the 
place by means of the chronometer. 
The view from the Imposible is finer and more extensive 
than that from the table-land of Quetepe. W e distinguished 
clearly by the naked eye the flattened top of the Brigantine 
(the position of which it would be important to fix accurately), 
the embarcadero or landing-place, and the roadstead of Cumana. 
The rocky coast of the peninsula of Araya was discernible 
in its whole length. We were particularly struck with the 
extraordinary configuration of a port, known by the name of 
Laguna Grande, or Laguna del Obispo. A vast basin, sur- 
rounded by high mountains, communicates with the gulf of 
Cariaco by a narrow channel which admits only of the passage 
of one ship at a time. This port is capable of containing 
several squadrons at once. It is an uninhabited place, but 
annually frequented by vessels, which carry mules to the 
West India Islands. There are some pasture grounds at 
the farther end of the bay. We traced the sinuosities of 
this arm of the sea, which, like a river, has dug a bed between 
perpendicular rocks destitute of vegetation. This singular 
prospect reminded us of the fanciful landscape which Leon- 
ardo da Vinci has made the back-ground of his famous 
portrait of Mona Lisa, the wife of Francisco del Giacondo. 
We could observe by the chronometer the moment when 
the disk of the sun touched the horizon of the sea. The 
first contact was at 6 h 8' 18" ; the second, at 6 h 10' 26", mean 
time. This observation, which is not unimportant for the 
theory of terrestrial refractions, was made on the summit 
of the mountain, at the absolute height of 296 toises. The 
setting of the sun was attended by a very rapid cooling of 
the air. Three minutes after the last apparent contact of 
the disk with the horizon of the sea, the thermometer sud- 
denly fell from 25 '2° to 21'8°. Was this extraordinary 
refrigeration owing to some descending current ? The air 
was however calm, and no horizontal wind was felt. 
We passed the night in a house where there was a military 
VOL. i. p 
