of lime. The largest shaft is 7 feet. They are all close together, within 100 yards, and about the same level: nowhere else could I find any. It cannot be doubted that the layers of fine sandstone have quietly been deposited between a clump of trees which were fixed by their roots. The sandstone rests on lava, is covered by a great bed apparently about 1,000 feet thick of black augitic lava, and over this there are at least 5 grand alternations of such rocks and aqueous sedimentary deposits, amounting in thickness to several thousand feet. I am quite afraid of the only conclusion which I can draw from this fact, namely that there must have been a depression in the surface of the land to that amount. But neglecting this consideration, it was a most satisfactory support of my presumption of the Tertiary (I mean by Tertiary, that the shells of the period were closely allied, or some identical, to those which now live, as in the lower beds of Patagonia) age of this eastern chain. A great part of the proof must remain upon my ipse dixit of a mineralogical resemblance with those beds whose age is known, and the character of which resemblance is to be subject to infinite variation, passing from one variety to another by a concretionary structure. I hardly expect you to believe me, when it is a consequence of this view that granite, which forms peaks of a height probably of 14,000 feet, has been fluid in the Tertiary period; that strata of that period are altered by its heat, and are traversed by dykes from the mass. That these strata have also probably undergone an immense depression, that they are now inclined at high angles and form regular or complicated anticlinal lines. To complete the climax and seal your disbelief, these same sedimentary strata and lavas are traversed by VERY NUMEROUS, true metallic veins of iron, copper, arsenic, silver and gold, and these can be traced to the underlying granite. A gold mine has been worked close to the clump of silicified trees. If when you see my specimens, sections and account, you should think that there is pretty strong presumptive evidence of the above facts, it appears very important; for the structure, and size of this chain will bear comparison with any in the world, and that this all should have been produced in so very recent a period is indeed wonderful. In my own mind I am quite convinced of the reality of this. I can anyhow most conscientiously say that no previously formed conjecture warped my judgment. As I have described so did I actually observe the facts. But I will have some mercy and end this most lengthy account of my geological trip.
On some of the large patches of perpetual snow, I found the famous red snow of the Arctic countries; I send with this letter my observations and a piece of paper on which I tried to dry some specimens. If the fact is new and you think it worth while, either yourself examine them or send them to whoever has described the specimens from the north and publish a notice in any of the periodicals. I also send a small bottle with two lizards, one of them is viviparous as you will see by the accompanying notice. A M. Gay--a French naturalist--has already published in one of the newspapers of this country a similar statement and probably has forwarded to Paris some account; as the fact appears singular would it not be worth while to hand over the specimens to some good lizardologist and comparative anatomist to publish an account of their internal structure? Do what you think fit.
This letter will go with a cargo of specimens from Coquimbo. I shall write to let you know when they are sent off. In the box there are two bags of seeds, one [from the] valleys of the Cordilleras 5,000-10,000 feet high, the soil and climate exceedingly dry, soil very light and stony, extremes in temperature; the other chiefly from the dry sandy Traversia of Mendoza 3,000 feet more or less. If some of the bushes should grow but not be healthy, try a slight sprinkling of salt and saltpetre.