sand, less than one-twentieth of an inch in thickness. How insignificant then must the proudest works of man appear—what a mere speck himself—to One who looks down from on high on this earth of ours!
On examining their sides in various parts, proof is afforded that these vast mountains have been heaved upwards from beneath the ocean. Shells are found 1300 feet above the sea, covered with marine mud. On a beach elevated 2500 feet above the Pacific, numerous species of patella and other shells can be picked up, identical with those obtained on the coast with the living animal inhabiting them. At Huanuco, in Peru, there is a coal-bed existing at the height of 14,700 feet. Shells have also been found at the height of 13,000 feet; and on the side of Chimborazo there is a salt spring 13,000 feet above the ocean.
The surface of the great lake of Titicaca—the largest piece of fresh-water in South America—is 12,795 feet above the Pacific; an elevation greater than that of the highest peaks of the Pyrenees. In the neighbourhood of this lake, remains exist which speak of the advanced state of civilisation of the inhabitants before the appearance of the Incas, with whose latter history alone we are acquainted. So completely is the lake surrounded by mountains, that, though fed by numerous streams, not the smallest rivulet escapes to find its way either into the Pacific or Atlantic. One large river, however, the Desaguadero, flows out of its south-west corner, and disappears in the swampy Lake Aullagas in the south of Bolivia. Its superabundant water must, therefore, be taken off by evaporation, excessive in that elevated region. High above it, amid chilling mists and biting storms of driving snow, are found the silver-mines of Potosi and Pasco.
However, before we wander further amid the giddy precipices and snow-capped summits of this mighty range of mountains, we will descend for a time to the lower world, and glance round its southern extremity and along its western shores, bathed by the waters of the wide-stretching Pacific.
