Nicaragua

NICARAGUA, the largest country of Central America, lying between Honduras and Costa Rica, which form its north and south boundaries, respectively, and reaching from the Caribbean sea on the east to the Pacific ocean on the west. Its area, which is still undetermined owing to boundary disputes with Honduras and incomplete surveys, is generally put at from 49,20o to 51,66o sq.m., the former being the most generally accepted. Pop. (192o census) 638,118, 13 to the square mile. The coast line is about 30o m. on the Caribbean and 200 m. on the Pacific. The Hon duran boundary as generally accepted starts at Cape Gracias a Dios, follows the Segovia river inland and then at 86° W. takes an imaginary line to the upper waters of the Rio Negro, which it follows to the Gulf of Fonseca. The Costa Rican boundary is now agreed upon, under treaties of 1858, confirmed in 1888 and settled in 1896, to be a line 2 m. S. of the San Juan river and Lake Nicaragua.

Physical Features.

Nicaragua is crossed by the two moun tain chains that traverse the Western Hemisphere, and which provide some fine highland valleys. Its most striking natural features, however, are the two great lakes, Lake Nicaragua, about ioo m. long and 45 m. wide, and Lake Managua, to the north of it, and connected with it by the Tipitapa river. Lake Managua's length is 38 m. and its width varies from 1 o to 16 miles.

The coasts of Nicaragua are strikingly different in configuration. The low, swampy and monotonous shore of the Caribbean, with its numerous lagoons and estuaries, and its fringe of reefs and islets, contains only three harbours : Gracias a Dios, Bluefields and Greytown (San Juan del Norte). The Pacific coast is bold, rocky and unbroken by any great indentation; here, however, are the best harbours of the republic—the southern arm of the Bay of Fonseca (q.v.), Corinto, Brito and San Juan del Sur.

The surface of the country is naturally divided into five clearly distinct zones: (I) the series of volcanic peaks which extend parallel to the Pacific at a little distance inland; (2) the plains and lakes of the great depression which lies to the east of these mountains and stretches from sea to sea, between the Bay of Fonseca and the mouths of the San Juan; (3) the main cordillera, which skirts the depression on the east, and trends north-west from Monkey Point or Punta Mico on the Caribbean sea, until it is merged in the ramifications of the Hondurian and Salva dorian highlands; (4) the plateaux which slope gradually away from the main cordillera towards the Caribbean; (5) the east or Mosquito coast (q.v.), with its low-lying hinterland. The

chain of volcanic cones, which constitutes a watershed quite equal in importance to the cordillera itself, consists for the most part of isolated igneous peaks, sometimes connected by low intervening ridges.

The main Nicaraguan cordillera, which flanks the depression on the east. has often been called the Cordillera de los Andes. from its supposed continuity with the mountain-chains of Panama and the west coast of South America. There is in fact no such con tinuity, for the San Juan valley completely separates the moun tains of Panama from the main Nicaraguan system. The main cordillera bears different names in different parts of Nicaragua. Thus the important section which terminates at Monkey Point is commonly called the Cordillera de Yolaina. The summits of the main cordillera seem nowhere to exceed 7,000 ft. in altitude; the mean elevation is probably less than 2,000 ft.; the declivity is sheer towards the lakes, and gradual towards the Caribbean. On the east, the cordillera abuts upon the region of plateaux and savannas, which occupies nearly half of the area of Nicaragua.

Climate.

The climate along the coasts, where most of the population lives, is hot and often sultry; in the highland sections there is the usual relatively cool and even climate of the tropical upland. There are two seasons, wet and dry, the former extend ing from May or June to November or December and dry in the remaining period, although on the east coast, the rainy season often extends well into the so-called dry period. Rainfall varies in different sections, as much as 297 in. a year having been recorded at Bluefields, on the Caribbean coast ; the mean at Rivas, on the Pacific side, is 102 in. a year.