ESfOEUOtlS tKEE. 
489 
humid. The azure of the sky is paler, and the elevated 
regions are loaded with light vapours, uniformly diffused. 
This season may be considered as the awakening of nature ; 
:t is a spring which, according to the received language of 
the Spanish colonies, proclaims the beginning of winter and 
succeeds to the heats of summer.* 
Indigo was formerly cultivated in the Quebrada Seca; 
but as the soil covered with vegetation cannot there con- 
centrate so much heat as the plains and the bottom of 
the Tuy valley receive and radiate, the cultivation of coffee 
has been substituted in its stead. As we advanced in the 
ravine we found the moisture increase. Near the llato, 
at the northern extremity of the Quebrada, a torrent rolls’ 
down over sloping beds of gneiss. An aqueduct was being 
formed there to convey the water to the plain. Without 
irrigation, agriculture makes no progress in these climates. 
A tree of monstrous size fixed our attention.! It lay or. 
the slope of the mountain, above the house of the liato. 
On the least dislodgment of the earth, its fall would have 
crushed the habitation which it shaded : it had therefore been 
burnt near its foot, and cut down in such a manner, that 
it fell between some enormous fig-trees, which prevented it 
from rolling into the ravine. We measured the fallen tree ; 
and though its summit had been burnt, the length of its’ 
trunk was still one hundred and fifty-four feet.j It was 
eight feet in diameter near the root's, and four feet two 
inches at the upper extremity. 
Our guides, less anxious than ourselves to measure the 
bulk of trees, continually pressed us to proceed onward and 
seek the ‘gold mine.’ This part of the ravine is little fre- 
quented, and is not uninteresting. We made the following 
observations on the geological constitution of the soil. At 
the entrance of the Quebrada Seca we remarked great 
masses of primitive saccharoidal limestone, tolerably fine 
* That part of the year most abundant in rain is called winter; so that 
in Terra Firms, the season which begins by the winter solstice, is desig- 
nated by the name of summer; and it is usual to hear, that it is winter 
on the mountains, at the time when summer prevails in tire neighbouring 
plains. 
+ Hura crepitans. 
J French measure, nearly fifty metres. 
