Geological Observations on South AmericaDarwin, Charles
Science
Geological Observations on South America
Darwin, Charles
Beagle Expedition (1831-1836); Geology -- South America; Mollusks, Fossil -- South America; Paleontology
The underlying marine tertiary strata extend over a wide area: I was
assured that they can be traced in ravines in an east and west line
across Entre Rios to the Uruguay, a distance of about 135 miles. In a
S.E. direction I heard of their existence at the head of the R. Nankay;
and at P. Gorda in Banda Oriental, a distance of 170 miles, I found the
same limestone, containing the same fossil shells, lying at about the
same level above the river as at St. Fe. In a southerly direction,
these beds sink in height, for at another P. Gorda in Entre Rios, the
limestone is seen at a much less height; and there can be little doubt
that the yellowish sandy clay, on a level with the river, between the
Carcarana and S. Nicholas, belongs to this same formation; as perhaps
do the beds of sand at Buenos Ayres, which lie at the bottom of the
Pampean formation, about sixty feet beneath the surface of the Plata.
The southerly declination of these beds may perhaps be due, not to
unequal elevation, but to the original form of the bottom of the sea,
sloping from land situated to the north; for that land existed at no
great distance, we have evidence in the vegetable remains in the lowest
bed at St. Fe; and in the silicified wood and in the bones of Toxodon
Paranensis, found (according to M. d’Orbigny) in still lower strata.
BANDA ORIENTAL.
This province lies on the northern side of the Plata, and eastward of
the Uruguay: it has a gentle undulatory surface, with a basis of
primary rocks; and is in most parts covered up with an unstratified
mass, of no great thickness, of reddish Pampean mud. In the eastern
half, near Maldonado, this deposit is more arenaceous than in the
Pampas, it contains many though small concretions of marl or
tosca-rock, and others of highly ferruginous sandstone; in one section,
only a few yards in depth, it rested on stratified sand. Near Monte
Video this deposit in some spots appears to be of greater thickness;
and the remains of the Glyptodon and other extinct mammifers have been
found in it. In the long line of cliffs, between fifty and sixty feet
in height, called the Barrancas de S. Gregorio, which extend westward
of the Rio S. Lucia, the lower half is formed of coarse sand of quartz
and feldspar without mica, like that now cast up on the beach near
Maldonado; and the upper half of Pampean mud, varying in colour and
containing honeycombed veins of soft calcareous matter and small
concretions of tosca-rock arranged in lines, and likewise a few pebbles
of quartz. This deposit fills up hollows and furrows in the underlying
sand; appearing as if water charged with mud had invaded a sandy beach.
These cliffs extend far westward, and at a distance of sixty miles,
near Colonia del Sacramiento, I found the Pampean deposit resting in
some places on this sand, and in others on the primary rocks: between
the sand and the reddish mud, there appeared to be interposed, but the
section was not a very good one, a thin bed of shells of an existing
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