Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent During the Years 1799-1804, Volumes 1-2Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1822 - Natural history |
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Page xii
... ancient forests , I experienced in my travels such enjoyments , as have amply compen- sated for the privations inseparable from a laborious , and often agitated life . These . enjoyments , which I endeavoured to im- part to my readers ...
... ancient forests , I experienced in my travels such enjoyments , as have amply compen- sated for the privations inseparable from a laborious , and often agitated life . These . enjoyments , which I endeavoured to im- part to my readers ...
Page xiv
... ancient continent during our abode in America , were saved ; the greater part fell into the hands of persons unknown to science . When a ship is condemned in a foreign port , boxes containing only dried plants or stones , far from being ...
... ancient continent during our abode in America , were saved ; the greater part fell into the hands of persons unknown to science . When a ship is condemned in a foreign port , boxes containing only dried plants or stones , far from being ...
Page xxviii
... ancient civi- lization , and the political division of their territory . It embraces at the same time the agriculture , the mineral riches , the ma- nufactures , the commerce , the finances , and the military defence of this vast coun ...
... ancient civi- lization , and the political division of their territory . It embraces at the same time the agriculture , the mineral riches , the ma- nufactures , the commerce , the finances , and the military defence of this vast coun ...
Page xxxi
... ancient civi- lization of the Americans , from the study of their monuments of architecture , their hieroglyphics , their religious rites , and their astrological reveries . I have given in this work a description of the teocalli , or ...
... ancient civi- lization of the Americans , from the study of their monuments of architecture , their hieroglyphics , their religious rites , and their astrological reveries . I have given in this work a description of the teocalli , or ...
Page xxxiii
... American vocabu laries , that has ever existed . His know- ledge of the ancient and modern languages being very extensive , he has made some VOL . I. d curious approximations on this object , so important for the xxxiii.
... American vocabu laries , that has ever existed . His know- ledge of the ancient and modern languages being very extensive , he has made some VOL . I. d curious approximations on this object , so important for the xxxiii.
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Common terms and phrases
according America ancient Andalusia angles appear astronomical Atlantic Atlantic Ocean atmosphere Azores barometer basalt Borda calcareous Canary islands Cape climate coasts color contains Cordilleras Corunna covered crater Cumana cyanometer Deluc distance earthquakes east elevated equinoctial eruption Europe extremely feet Globe Guanches gulf gulf of Cariaco heat height horizon hundred toises hygrometer inches inhabitants instruments isle Lanzerota lavas leagues less longitude magnetic mass mean temperature measure ments meridian Mexico mountains naturalists nature navigators needle observations obsidian ocean Oroonoko oscillations Peak of Teneriffe Peru phenomena phenomenon Piton plain plants porphyries port of Orotava pumice pumice stone quantity Quito regions rocks sail salt Santa Cruz Saussure scarcely shocks snows Spain Spanish species strata summit surface tains Teneriffe thermometer tion toises torrid zone travellers trees tropics vapors variations vegetation vessel Vesuvius volcano voyage wind
Popular passages
Page 268 - In the solitude of the seas, we hail a star as a friend, from whom we have been long separated. Among the Portuguese and the Spaniards, peculiar motives seem to increase this feeling ; a religious sentiment attaches them to a constellation, the form of which recalls the sign of the faith, planted by their ancestors in the deserts of the new world.
Page 266 - A traveller has no need of being a botanist, to recognise the torrid zone on the mere aspect of its vegetation ; and without having acquired any notions of astronomy, without any acquaintance with the celestial charts of Flamstead and de la Caille, he feels he is not in Europe, when he sees the immense constellation of the Ship, or the phosphorescent clouds of Magellan, arise on the horizon. The heaven, and the earth, every thing in the equinoctial regions, assumes an exotic character.
Page 268 - It is a time-piece that advances very regularly nearly four minutes a day, and no other group of stars exhibits, to the naked eye, an observation of time so easily made. How often have we heard our guides exclaim in the savannas of Venezuela, or in the desert extending from Lima to Truxillo, • midnight is past, the cross begins to bend'.
Page 169 - The slaves exposed to sale were young men from fifteen to twenty years of age. Every morning cocoa-nut oil was distributed among them, with which they rubbed their bodies, to give their skin a black polish. The persons who came to purchase examined the teeth of these slaves, to judge of their age and health; forcing open their mouths as we do those of horses in a market.
Page 150 - Cumana it has already been observed that flames and vapors mixed with sulphurous acid spring up from the most arid soil. In other parts of the same province the earth ejects water and petroleum. At Riobamba a muddy and inflammable mass, called moya, issues from crevices that close again, and accumulates into elevated hills.
Page 209 - Let us announce to them that God " hath made of one blood all nations of men that dwell on the face of the earth.
Page 251 - ... of the globe where the continents are of very different breadths, and where they stretch away more or less towards the poles. It is known, that in the passage from Santa Cruz to Cumana, as in that from Acapulco to the Philippine Islands, seamen are scarcely ever under the necessity of working their sails. We pass those latitudes as if we were descending a river, and we might deem it no hazardous undertaking if we made the voyage in an open boat.
Page 159 - Sea, the action is almost instantaneously communicated from Chili to the gulf of Guayaquil, a distance of six hundred leagues...
Page 44 - Mimosa scandens, of Dolichos urens, of Guilandina bonduc, and several other plants of Jamaica, the isle of Cuba, and of the neighbouring continent. The current carries thither also barrels of French wine, well preserved, the remains of the cargoes of vessels wrecked in the West Indian seas. To these examples of the...
Page 185 - That part of the island we had landed on was a narrow ridge, not above a musket-shot across, bounded on one side by the sea, and on the other by a creek, extending upwards of a mile inland, and nearly communicating with the sea at its head.