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Updated: June 22, 2025
A fortunate chance led us to observe some very curious geological phenomena, which we again met with in the Cordilleras of Mexico. The limestone of Barcelona has a dull, even, or conchoidal fracture, with very flat cavities. It is divided into very thin strata, and exhibits less analogy with the limestone of Cumanacoa, than with that of Caripe, forming the cavern of the Guacharo.
During the whole time of our stay at Cumanacoa, the summit of this mountain was covered with clouds. It appeared uncovered on the evening of the 11th of September, but only for a few minutes. The angle of elevation, taken from the great square of Cumanacoa, was 8 degrees 2 minutes.
We saw the appearance of flames in many parts of eastern America subject to earthquakes, even from secondary rocks, as at Cuchivero, near Cumanacoa. The fire shows itself when the ground, strongly heated by the sun, receives the first rains; or when, after violent showers, the earth begins to dry.
In the province of Caracas, where 562 cubic feet of the plant slightly piled up yield thirty-five or forty pounds of dry indigo, the liquid does not pass into the beater till after twenty, thirty, or thirty-five hours. The plain of Cumanacoa, spotted with farms and small plantations of indigo and tobacco, is surrounded with mountains, which towards the south rise to considerable height.
The road first runs eastward, crossing over the length of three leagues the table-land of Cumanacoa, in a soil formerly levelled by the waters: it then turns to the south. We passed the little Indian village of Aricagua surrounded by woody hills. Thence we began to ascend, and the ascent lasted more than four hours.
When Cumana, after the capture of Trinidad by the English, in 1797, was threatened with an attack, many of the inhabitants fled to Cumanacoa, and deposited whatever articles of value they possessed in sheds hastily constructed on the top of the Imposible.
This geological phenomenon, which is repeated in every climate, seems to indicate a long abode of the waters in basins that have poured them from one to the other. The calcareous rock is no longer visible, but is covered with a thick layer of mould. The last time we saw it in the forest of Santa Maria it was slightly porous, and looked more like the limestone of Cumanacoa than that of Caripe.
Descending the Cuchillo de Guanaguana towards the convent of Caripe, we find another more recent formation, white, with a smooth or slightly conchoidal fracture, and divided in very thin layers, which succeeds to the bluish grey limestone formation of Cumanacoa.
At Cumanacoa, the dry season begins at the winter solstice, and lasts till the vernal equinox. Light showers are frequent in the months of April, May, and June. The dry weather then returns again, and lasts from the summer solstice to the end of August. Then come the real winter rains, which cease only in the month of November, and during which torrents of water pour down from the skies.
The plain, or rather the table-land, on which the town of Cumanacoa is situated, is not more than 104 toises above the level of the sea, which is three or four times less than is supposed by the inhabitants of Cumana, on account of their exaggerated ideas of the cold of Cumanacoa.
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