,895.] 551 [Crawford. 
At the southern base of the cone Santa Chira are several large 
springs of water whose streams unite near the exposed ends of 
the fissures and interstratum spaces from which they flow, and 
form the Rio Que-sal-qua-que which disembogues into the tide- 
water estuary Paso Cabillo near the Port of Corinto.^ A much 
larger quantity of water from these springs percolates through 
the strata and small fissures for a distance of over 7 miles, and 
then pours out over the surface of hard lavas of rhyolite, phono- 
lite, and trachyte, forming the liio Chiquito which flows through 
the eastern and southern parts of the City of Leon, and is fai- 
more than sufficient to supply the needs of the 60,000 inhabitants 
of that city and their more numerous domestic animals. Thence 
it flows into the Paso Cabillo near the mouth of the Que-sal- 
qua-que. 
From the large springs issuing from the base of Santa Clara 
west to the southern foot of the group of four cones on the west- 
ern end of Cerro Viejo is a distance of about twenty-eight miles, 
and in this interval more than fifty large springs of water rush 
out from between strata or from fissures that open at the extreme 
southern base of the Cerro, and each of them forms a small 
creek that finally discharges its silt, sand, and water into the Paso 
Cabillo. Even in the annual "dry season" these waters so fully 
supply the 144 square miles of the southeastern pai-tof the valley 
of Chinandega as to enable its fertile volcanic soil to support 
large groves of evergreen trees and to produce annually under 
cultivation large crops of cacao (^Theohromd)^ plantains {Musa 
paradisiaca), bananas {Musa sapientum.), mangoes {Mangi- 
ferea), indigo {Indigoferea), sapota {Sapotes achras)^ anatto 
{Bixa orelland)^ corn, sugar-cane, rice, beans, oranges, lemons, 
limes, figs, grasses, etc., etc."^ 
1 The estuary Paso Cabillo separates the island of Coiinto from the main land. Its 
southern termination is the Port of Corinto, and its northern at the east of the 
island of Ascedadores in Nicaragua. 
2 Numerous excavations from 75 to 150 feet deep to the hard trap rock rajjidly fill 
with water from 3 to G feet in depth. These wells, whose waters are for the most 
part warm, give evidence of the great quantity of high-tension, aqueous vapors that 
are continually forming in the caverns and are condensed into water on their passage 
from the caverns to the surface of the earth. There is not rainfall enough during 
the dry season to account for all the moisture, although it is true that this valley 
does not suffer from the drying effects of the currents from Bering Sea, since they 
are deflected southward at lat. 22 N. and long. 95 VV. from Greenwich, at a point of 
land more than a hundred miles to the west of this valley. 
