. The earth and its inhabitants ... still but thinly peopled, with many districts quiteuninhabited. Such is the valley of the Atrato, one of the richest but, at the same 208 SOUTH AMEEICA—THE ANDES EEGIONS. time, one of the unliealthiest regions in the world. In 1885, White estimatedits entire population at about 40,000, of whom three-fourths were negroid half-breeds and one-fourth whites, whose chief resources were gold, gums, rubber,bark and other drugs collected in the forests. Qiiihdo, the chief place in this basin, lies on the right bank of the Atrato, 250miles above its mouth, and below
. The earth and its inhabitants ... still but thinly peopled, with many districts quiteuninhabited. Such is the valley of the Atrato, one of the richest but, at the same 208 SOUTH AMEEICA—THE ANDES EEGIONS. time, one of the unliealthiest regions in the world. In 1885, White estimatedits entire population at about 40,000, of whom three-fourths were negroid half-breeds and one-fourth whites, whose chief resources were gold, gums, rubber,bark and other drugs collected in the forests. Qiiihdo, the chief place in this basin, lies on the right bank of the Atrato, 250miles above its mouth, and below the Cuia confluence. The neighbouring hillscontain coal- and copper-mines, and at certain seasons prodigious shoals of fishascend the river, which has an average depth of 10 feet, and is navigable forsteamers to this point. A bad road, crossing the Western Cordillera at a height of 6,800 feet, connectsQuibdo with Bolivar, in the Cauca valley. But the stream of migration to these Fig. 82.—Poet of 1 : 650, 77°2Q- West oF G reenwicr Depths. 0 to 5Fathoms. 6 to 25Fathoms. 25 Fathomsand upwards. 12 Miles. uplands sets chiefly from Antioquia, whose enterprising citizens have alreadyfounded several settlements, such as Urrao, near the source of the Murri aflluentof the Atrato ; Canasgordas and Frontino, about the headwaters of the Sucio, whichjoins the Atrato above its delta. NoviTA—Buenaventura—El Oastigo. In the upper basin of the San Juan, whence comes much of the platinum usedin the world, the chief centre of population is Novita, which, like Quibdo, is builton piles. On the neighbouring Pacific coastlands the only port visited by skippersis Baudo, which lies on a tidal river of like name. TOPOGRAPHY OF COLOMBIA. 209 Buenaventura, on an islet at the eastern extremity of a long inlet south of theHio San Juan, attracts to its port about three-fourths of all the foreign trade ofthe Cauca basin. The deep and well-sheltered bight had been discovered in
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectgeography, bookyear18
