powerful influence on the public prosperity. Provinces separated by
steppes would then appear to be brought nearer to each other; several
kinds of inland merchandize would diminish in price on the coast; and
by increasing the number of camels, above all the species called
hedjin, or the ship of the desert, a new life would be given to the
industry and commerce of the New World.

On the evening of the 22nd we continued our journey from Mocundo by
Los Guayos to the city of Nueva Valencia. We passed a little forest of
palm-trees, which resembled, by their appearance, and their leaves
spread like a fan, the Chamaerops humilis of the coast of Barbary. The
trunk, however, rises to twenty-four and sometimes thirty feet high.
It is probably a new species of the genus corypha; and is called in
the country palma de sombrero, the footstalks of the leaves being
employed in weaving hats resembling our straw hats. This grove of
palm-trees, the withered foliage of which rustles at the least breath
of air--the camels feeding in the plain--the undulating motion of the
vapours on a soil scorched by the ardour of the sun, give the
landscape an African aspect. The aridity of the land augments as the
traveller approaches the town, after passing the western extremity of
the lake. It is a clayey soil, which has been levelled and abandoned
by the waters. The neighbouring hills, called Los Morros de Valencia,
are composed of white tufa, a very recent limestone formation,
immediately covering the gneiss. It is again found at Victoria, and on
several other points along the chain of the coast. The whiteness of
this tufa, which reflects the rays of the sun, contributes greatly to
the excessive heat felt in this place. Everything seems smitten with
sterility; scarcely are a few plants of cacao found on the banks of
the Rio de Valencia; the rest of the plain is bare, and destitute of
vegetation. This appearance of sterility is here attributed, as it is