At the top of the gorge, is a small lake or pond, of which the water never freezes; and at less than 700 feet distant from this on each side, are the sources of the Cauca and the Magdalena. Goods are often left in this place, because the muleteers will not run the risk of quitting it between suns, and therefore return to take them up the next morning. The distance from Popayan to La Plata (the town on the Magdalena, where the journey terminates) is about nineteen or twenty leagues, which generally occupies twenty or twenty-two days to travel; but the time taken to pass the actual ridge is about a day, and there are habitations, at intervals on each side; not so the other road, which leads from Popayan, by the mountains of Quindiu, between the cities, or rather towns of Ibague and Carthago, in 4° 36ʹ north latitude; and is the most difficult to scale, when taken in the sense of a road, of any in the whole Cordillera, crossing a thick untenanted forest, which, in the most favourable weather, is not passable under ten or twelve days. No hut is to be seen, or any means of subsistence procured, and the venturous traveler must take with him at least a monthʼs provisions; as the sudden thaws and swellings of rivers render it frequently impracticable to go forward or return. The highest point of this pass is 11,499 feet above the level of the sea; and is styled Garito de Paramo. The path is not more than a foot and a half broad, and has, in several points, the appearance of a gallery, whose surface has been taken off, and the whole is bottomed with muddy clay; the torrents which rush down the rocks, forming every here and there narrow beds, from twenty to twenty-five feet in depth, along which the passenger must work his way in the mud, encompassed by a wall of rocks, covered with vegetation of luxuriant growth, which renders these places nearly dark. Along these galleries, many of which are a mile and a half in length, the oxen employed to carry baggage, and whose feet are better adapted than those of mules, for struggling through the tough and deep clay, can hardly force their way. The meeting with other travellers, in such a situation, is highly troublesome, as there is the greatest difficulty to pass. The roots of the bamboos, studded with strong prickles, projecting from the sides of the mountains, are among the other inconveniences, combined with the necessity of crossing the icy waters of the torrents, and of being deluged with the incessant rains which prevail here. The colonists, whose affairs oblige them to go by this route, are carried in chairs on menʼs backs, by a set of people who are bred to this business; and who are generally either creoles or mulattoes.