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Updated: June 11, 2025
The whole of this mountainous country, by which the littoral chain of Caracas is linked to the Cordilleras of Cundinamarca, was celebrated in Europe in the middle of the nineteenth century; for that part of the territory formed of gneiss-granite, and lying between the Rio Tocuyo and the Rio Yaracui, contains the auriferous veins of Buria, and the copper-mine of Aroa which is worked at the present day.
Notwithstanding this delay, or rather owing to the slowness with which we passed through Cundinamarca, the provinces of Popayan and Quito, I did not regret having sacrificed the passage of the isthmus to the route of Bogota, for every step of the journey was full of interest both geographically and botanically.
PLAINS: Llanos of the Lower Orinoco, the Meta, : 29,000. and the Guaviare Plains of the Amazon : 260,400. Pampas of Rio de la Plata and Patagonia : 135,200. Plains between the eastern chain of the Andes of Cundinamarca and the chain of Choco : 12,300. Plains of the shore on the west of the Andes : 20,000.
It bears different names, as the mountains of Coro, of Caracas, of the Bergantin, of Barcelona, of Cumana, and of Paria; but all these names belong to the same chain, of which the northern part runs along the coast of the Caribbean Sea. This system of mountains, which is 160 leagues long,* is a prolongation of the eastern Cordillera of the Andes of Cundinamarca.
It is also worthy of remark that, by the separation of one of the branches of the Cordilleras of Cundinamarca and by the deviation of the chain of Bogota towards the north-east, the colossal group of the mountains of Merida is enclosed in the territory of the ancient Capitania-general of Venezuela, and that the continuity of the same mountainous land from Pamplona to Barquisimeto and Nirgua may be said to have facilitated the political union of the Columbian territory.
In Mexico we see a vast monarchy enclosing small republics; at Cundinamarca and Peru we find pure theocracies.
The Rio Sinu in its upper course approaches the tributary streams of the Atrato which, to the auriferous and platiniferous province of Choco, is of the same importance as the Magdalena to Cundinamarca, or the Rio Cauca to the provinces of Antioquia and Popayan.
There seems to be no connection between the history of Mexico and that of Cundinamarca and of Peru; but in the plains of the east a warlike and long-dominant nation betrays in its features and its physical constitution traces of a foreign origin. The Caribs preserve traditions that seem to indicate ancient communications between North and South America.
I will not anticipate the description which I shall have hereafter to give of New Grenada; but, in order to render my observations on the statistics of Venezuela more useful to those who would judge of the political importance of the country and the advantages it may offer to the trade of Europe, even in its present unadvanced state of cultivation, I will describe the United Provinces of Venezuela in their relations with Cundinamarca, or New Grenada, and as forming part of the new state of Columbia.
Thus it has happened that in the war of independence they have been the scene of struggle between the hostile parties; and that the inhabitants of Calabozo have almost seen the fate of the confederate provinces of Venezuela and Cundinamarca decided before their walls.
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