Page:Mexico, Aztec, Spanish and Republican, Vol 2.djvu/418

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346
PROFILE—MEXICO TO SANTA FÉ—SANTA FÉ TO THE GULF.

APPENDIX NO. 1.


PROFILE OF THE PLATEAU — MEXICO TO SANTA FÉ — SANTA FE TO THE GULF.

In order to afford the geographical student an idea of the central configuration of Mexico, we annex the following tables of the lines of levelling made by Baron Humboldt, Dr. Wislizenius, Oteiza, and Burkart, northwardly from the city of Mexico to Santa Fé; and eastwardly from Santa Fé to Reynosa near the Gulf of Mexico. From the first of these we learn that the plateau which forms the broad crest of the Mexican Cordillera by no means sinks down to an inconsiderable height as was long supposed to be the case but that it maintains, throughout, its majestic elevation.

1st. Elevation above the sea from the city of Mexico to Santa Fe. 2d. From Santa Fe in New Mexico to Reynosa on the Rio Grande.
Mexico 7,469 ft. above sea. Santa Fe 7,047 ft. above sea
Tula 6,733 3miles N. of Alburquerque near the Rio Grande 4,813
San Juan del Rio 6,490 Jornado del Muerto 4,452
Querétaro 6,362 Brazito 3,918
Celaya 6,017 Upon crossing of the Rio Grande 3,797
Salamanca 5,761 Paso del Norte 3,810
Guanajuato 6,836 S. of Rio Carmen 4,219
Silao 5,911 S. of Gallego 5,317
Villa de Leon 6,133 Rio Sacramento 4,940
Lagos 6,376 Chihuahua 4,638
Aguas Calientes 6,261 Aguachi 5,952
San Luis Potosi 6,090 Cosihuiriachi 6,273
Zacatécas 8,038 Bachimba 3,956
Fresnillo 7,244 El Saucillo 3,955
Durango 6,848 Cadena 5,056
Parras 4,985 Mapimi 4,487
Saltillo, 5,240 El Bolson de Mapimi 3,785
El Bolson de Mapimi 3,785 Parras 4,985
Chihuahua 4,638 La Encantada 6,104
Cosihuiriachi 6,273 Saltillo 5,240
Paso del Norte on the Rio Grande 3,810 Rinconada 3,381
Santa Fé in New Mexico 7,047 Monterey 1,626
Marin 1,354
Ceralvo 1,006
Mier 417
Camargo 422
[1] Reynosa 104

"If we consider,"—says Humboldt in his Views of Nature,—"that in the north and south direction the difference of latitude between Santa Fé and the city of Mexico is more than sixteen degrees, and that consequently the distance in a meridian direction, independently of curvatures on the road is more than 960 miles, we are led to ask whether in the whole world, there exists any similar formation of equal extent and height, between 5,000 and 7,500 feet, above the level of the sea. Four-wheeled wagons can travel from Mexico to Santa Fé. The plateau whose levelling is here described is formed solely by the broad undulating flattened crest of the chain of the Mexican Andes; it is not the swelling of a valley between two mountain chains, such as the Great Basin between the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada of California in the Northern Hemisphere; or the elevated plateau of the Lake of Titicaca, between the eastern and northern chains of Bolivia; or the plateau of Tibet between the Himilaya and Quenlun, in the Southern Hemisphere."—Page 209, Humb. Views of Nature.

  1. See Humboldt's Views of Nature, London edition, 1850, p. 208, and Dr. Wislizenius's Profiles of the country in his Memoir on New Mexico, &c., &c.