The rivers of this province are the Rio Tula, which rises near the lakes, and receives several small rivers from the mountains, as well as the superabundant waters of the upper lake; and after a course through the whole north-eastern part of the province, crosses the intendancy of Vera Cruz, and falls into the river Panuco, or Tampico, near the town of Panuco, close to the Mexican gulf.
The great river Santiago also rises in this province, in the Nevado of Toluca, and is called Rio de Lerma, for a considerable length; it has already been described.
The next and last great river of consequence is the Rio Zacatula, which rises in the Cordillera of Anahuac, and discharges itself into the Pacific, at the town of Zacatula, on the confines of the province of Valladolid.
THE INTENDANCY OF VALLADOLID OR MECHOACAN
Is bounded on the north by the river Lerma, or Santiago, and Guanaxuato, east by Mexico, west by Guadalaxara and the Pacific Ocean, and south by Mexico; its length is 78 leagues, its breadth 38.
This country enjoys a salubrious climate, owing to its situation along the western side of the great Cordillera of Mexico; on the coast of the Pacific the air is not so good, and the climate in some parts unhealthy.
Travellers speak with much delight of this province; it presents some charming scenery, and in the valleys surrounded by mountains, it has all the variety of hill, dale, water and forest.
The land in some districts is very high, but no part if the country offers so singular a feature, as the volcanic mountain of Jorullo, which rose from the plains in one night The highest point of Valladolid is the Pico de Tancitaro, and a little to the east of it, is the volcanic production above-mentioned; which, in the midst of the darkness of the night on the 29th of September, 1759, rose from the bosom of the plain.
Previous to this wonderful event, the ground consisted of part of an immensely extended plain between some ranges of mountains. This plain was covered with cultivation, and elevated from 2460 to 2624 feet above the level of the ocean. The sugar cane and indigo were thriving, and the inhabitants of the district, or plantation, which was reckoned as the richest of the kingdom, looked forward with delight to the prospect of the fruits they were to derive from their labour. A confused noise under the surface of the plantation was distinctly heard in June, 1759; to which succeeding alarming earthquakes for a month, the inhabitants fled from the devastation they imagined was about to overwhelm them; but these convulsions ceasing for a time, they thought that the effect was at an end, and returned to their beloved spot. For nearly the whole month of September nothing extraordinary appeared, when on the night of the 28th and near the morning of the 29th, the dreadful rumbling noise again began beneath the plain. The affrighted natives fled to the mountains, and forsook their homes; an immense tract suddenly rose and swelled itself into an enormous convex hill 524 feet in perpendicular height above the plain. This phenomenon continued to vomit fire to an amazing extent; rocks of enormous magnitude were cast up, and two rivers were swallowed into the bosom of the burning entrails of the newly formed hill; the land of the plain was also seen to undulate like the waves of the ocean.
Thousands of small conical mounds, enveloped in basaltes, started up, and studded the hill with their knobs, each of these is a little volcano, occasionally vomiting smoke; amidst them, six large hills, elevated themselves above the main body, from 312 to 1640 feet in height, above the mass of cones.