Bulletin of the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences (Volume 1, No. 4)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1874. Excerpt: ... XXII. Contributions to the Geology and Physical Geography of the Lower Amazonas BY CH. FRED. HARTT, Prof, of Geology in Cornell University. Mead before this Society, January 2, 1874. THE ERERE-MONTE-ALEGRE DISTRICT AND THE TABLE-TOPPED HILLS. Ascending the Amazonas from Para, the topographical features observable from the river for the first 300 miles, are very monotonous. With the exception of the immediate vicinity of Para, Breves and Gurupa, where the land rises to a height of twenty to thirty feet above tide-level, the country is perfectly fiat, scarcely above water even in the dry season, and of recent origin. Where BIX. BUF. SOC. NAT. SCI. (26) JANUABY, 1874. the land is perennially wet, as along the furos connecting the main river and the Para estuary, it is so densely forest-clothed that, from the water, one sees nothing hut foliage, and the land-effect is produced not by terra firma, but by the forest-wall that at once borders and limits the channels. Were the vegetation removed from the region just mentioned, the vision of the traveler, instead of being shut in everywhere by the forest, would range over a tract as level as the sea. Enormous mnd flats, partially covered by every tide, nowhere more than a very few feet out of water, traversed by a network of deep channels, and diversified by lakes, would be seen stretching away to the horizon on every side, only here and there a torrao, like that of Breves, rising above the general dead level. Such would be the appearance of the Breves district during the dry season if deprived of trees; but, during the rains, the Amazonas deluges the whole region and pours over it in one broad sheet into the bay of Marajo. To rightly appreciate the topography of the lower Amazonas, we must eliminate the effect pr...