South America is a triangular continent, with its axis, the Andes, not central, as in Europe, but lying on its extreme western edge, and in harmony with the well-known law that the highest mountains and the grandest volcanoes face the broadest ocean. The highlands of Brazil and Guiana have neither volcanic nor snow-clad peaks.[53] Like all the dry land which first appeared, these primitive mountains on the Atlantic border trend east and west. The result of this position is a triple river system—the Orinoco, Amazon, and La Plata, draining three immense plains—the llanos of Venezuela, the sylvas of Brazil, and the pampas of the Argentine Republic. The continuity and extent of these vast depressions are more remarkable even than the height and length of the mountain chains.[54]
Such are the characteristic features of South America; they are not repeated in any other continent.[55] Not one feature could be changed without destroying those peculiarities of soil and climate which so remarkably distinguish South America. Its position on the equator places it in the path of the vapory trade winds, which continually sweep over it westward till they strike the Andes, which, like a great condenser, roll a thousand streams eastward again to feed the mighty Amazon. So effectual is that barrier, not a drop of moisture passes it, and the trade wind is not felt again on the Pacific till you are one hundred and fifty miles from the coast. Were the Andes on the Atlantic side, South America would be turned into a vast Sahara. As it is, the interest which attaches to this continent, save a few relics of the Incas, is exclusively that of pure nature. Nowhere does Nature affect us more deeply with the feeling of her grandeur; nowhere does she exhibit wilder freaks or more startling contrasts; nowhere do we find such a theatre for the free development of vegetable and animal life.
The long and lofty chain of the Andes is certainly one of the grandest results of the plications and uplifts of the earth's crust. While the waves of the Pacific, from Panama to Patagonia, submissively kiss the feet of the Andes, and the showers that swell the Amazon fall within sight of the mariner on that peaceful ocean, the Rocky Mountains are situated five hundred miles from the sea. The space west of the Andes does not contain 20,000 square leagues, while the country east of it equals 424,600. While the compact Andes have an average width of only sixty miles,[56] the straggling mountain system beyond the Mississippi has the breadth of the Empire State; but the mean elevation of the latter would scarcely reach the bottom of the Quito Valley. The mountains of Asia may surpass the Cordilleras in height, but, situated beyond the tropics, and destitute of volcanoes, they do not present that inexhaustible variety of phenomena which characterizes the latter. The outbursts of porphyry and trachytic domes, so characteristic of the high crests of the Cordilleras, impart a physiognomy quite distinct from that presented by the mountains of Europe. The Andes offer, in the least space, the greatest possible variety of impressions.[57] There is near Huanca, Peru, a coal-bed lifted up to the enormous height of 14,700 feet, and on the side of Chimborazo there is a salt spring 13,000 feet above the sea. Marine shells have not been found in Europe above the summit of the Pyrenees, or 11,700 feet; but the Andes can show some a thousand feet higher. A strange sight, to see shells once crawling on the bottom of the ocean now resting at an elevation twice the height of Mount Washington!
Beneath the Southern Cross, out of a sea perpetually swept by fearful gales, rise the rocky hills of Terra del Fuego. It is the starting-point of that granite chain which winds around the earth in a majestic curve, first northwesterly to the Arctic Sea, thence by the Aleutian and Japanese Isles to Asia, crossing the Old World southwesterly from China to South Africa.
Skirting the bleak shores of Patagonia in a single narrow sierra, the Andes enter Chile, rising higher and higher till they culminate in the gigantic porphyritic peak of Aconcagua. At the boundary-line of Bolivia, the chain, which has so far followed a precise meridional direction, turns to the northwest, and, at the same time, separates into two Cordilleras, inclosing the great table-land of Desaguadero. This wonderful valley, the Thibet of the New World, has four times the area of New York State, and five times the elevation of the Catskill Mountain House. At one end of the valley, perched above the clouds, is silvery Potosi, the highest city in the world; at the other stands the once golden capital of Cuzco. Between them is Lake Titicaca [58] (probably an ancient crater), within which is an island celebrated as the cradle of the strange empire of Peru, which, though crushed by Pizarro in its budding civilization, ranks as the most extraordinary and extensive empire in the annals of American history. The Cordillera, of which Sahama, Sorata, and Illimani are the pinnacles, so completely inclose this high valley that not a drop of water can escape except by evaporation. At the silver mines of Pasco the Andes throw off a third cordillera, and with this triple arrangement and a lower altitude, enter the republic of Ecuador. There they resume the double line, and surpass their former magnificence. Twenty volcanoes, presided over by the princely Chimborazo and Cotopaxi, rise out of a sublime congregation of mountains surrounding the famous valley of Quito. In New Granada there is a final and unique display of Andine grandeur: the Cordilleras combine just above the equator into one dizzy ridge, and then spread out like a fan, or, rather, like the graceful branches of the palm. One sierra bends to the east, holding in its lap the city of Bogota, and, rolling off a thousand streams to swell the Orinoco, terminates in the beautiful mountains of Caracas; the central range culminates in the volcanic Tolima,[59] but is soon lost in the Caribbean Sea; the western chain turns to the left, humbling itself as it threads the narrow isthmus, and expands into the level table-land of Mexico. You may cross Mexico from ocean to ocean in a carriage, but no wheeled vehicle ever crossed South America.
Ecuadorian Volcanoes
10,000 ft. Chimborazo.
