the point of vantage on which I stood I could count
as many as eight of those huge lines of waves. Evidently at some remote
period--it would be difficult to say how many thousands of years
ago--that was a gigantic mass of molten stuff in commotion. In many
places it was apparent that the great waves of molten rock had flowed
over and partly overlapped the lower ones. In its higher north-easterly
point the basin was wooded.

The great basin extended southward. In that direction all the lower
ridges with their arched backs showed a depression or dip. On the S.S.W.
two more great domes of wonderfully perfect curves were to be observed,
and on the south-west stood an isolated gigantic quadrangular mountain of
solid rock, with the usual buttresses in the lower portion typical of
that region.

To the south-east a lovely square-shaped plateau of marvellously graceful
lines stood prominent in the centre of the basin. In the same direction,
only a few hundred yards off, was a most peculiar angular rock, which
looked exactly like the magnified crest of an immense wave. That was just
what it had been formerly--the wave, of course, of a gigantic molten mass
of rock, set in violent motion by an immeasurable force. It was the
terminal point of the great succession of rocky waves which we had
skirted to the north in order to arrive at that point, and which extended
from the great semicircle we had passed the previous day.

[Illustration: Strange Rock-Carvings of Matto Grosso.]

At the terminal point of those rocky waves--or wherever the rock was
exposed--it was evident that all those undulations had received a similar
movement and had formed the great backbone range of rock, fully
exposed in the last undulation. I had observed the continuation of this
great rock crest the previous day in the basin previous to reaching the
Capim Branco valley. There it crossed the spur on which I
was--"Observation Spur," I shall call it for purposes of
identification--almost at right angles. It seemed as if two forces had
been acting simultaneously but in different directions, and at various
points had come into conflict and eventually had overrun each other.

The last great rocky crest at Capim Branco, when seen in profile, looked
like a huge monolith with a slight inclination to the south-east. The
formation of the rock itself showed a frothy appearance, such as is
common with any liquefied matter while in a state of ebullition.

It is quite p