Page:Travels in Uruguay.pdf/53

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38
TRAVELS IN URUGUAY.

over the perpendicular precipice of 2400 feet on the upright side of this rock, to the botanic gardens below that I had visited the day before. You could see the different merchants" houses scattered along the roads, looking less than pins' heads;valley beyond valley, and hill on hill surmounting one ano-ther, crowned beyond by the more distant but far higher cones of Tichuga and other peaks, some having flat tops, and terminating the landscape south and westward, in istant succession. Beneath was the harbour with its shipping, and islands in beautiful variety, every part of the landscape differ-ent, and yet ontributing to the whole. You could look down into every bay and fort on the opposite side; and the eye could trace up the several valleys, until lofty hills limited the view. Here you perceived the vast height of the Organ mountains better than from below, 8-10,000 feet high; and yet, though nearly fifty miles off, looking quite near.The forests that clothe the summit of the Corcovada, and the cultivated aspect of everything-its inhabited appear-from the number of houses that are scattered about in every direction, and that line the little bays and crown the promontories,-added greatly, in contrast with the Alpine scene, to the beauty of the prospect. I could hardly tear myself from this matchless spot; but as it was past five o'clock, and I had seven miles descent home, I was forced, though I again and again returned to it, to depart-never to see such again. What a traveller has said is true to the life-"The first effect of tropical scenery on those accus- tomed before to the gloomy leaden colouring of our northern clime is so dazzling, that it appears to us impossible any other place in this world can be so perfectly beautiful, and beyond description, either in prose or verse, as Rio.""