"To breatheThe difficult air of the iced mountain's top."
"To breatheThe difficult air of the iced mountain's top."
"To breathe
The difficult air of the iced mountain's top."
I soon recovered, however, and was amply repaid by the splendor of the view. The lofty cone-shaped mountain, clad in its brilliant mantle from the top even to the cylindrical base upon which it rested, rose in solitary majesty from the plain beneath us; and when the sunlight, bursting from the clouds, rested upon its summit, it was beautiful, indeed. Gibbon almost froze taking a sketch of it; and the rest of us tired ourselves nearly to death endeavoring to get a shot at a herd of shy vicuñas that were seen feeding among the distant rocks. We had a fatiguing ride, and enjoyed a late dinner and a good night's rest.
June 4.—We took leave of our hospitable friends, (whom I could no longer intrude our large party upon,) and started at meridian, leaving Richards too sick to travel. We rode down the "Valley of the Lakes" in about an E. N. E. direction, visiting the silver mining hacienda of Tuctu as we passed, which belongs to the establishment of Morococha. We travelled over a heavy rolling country; the southern sides of the hills clothed with verdure, and affording tolerable pasture; the northern sides bare and rocky—no trees or bushes. About nine miles from Morococha, we crossed a range of hills to the right, and entered the village ofPachachaca.
This is situated in a valley that comes down from Yauli. The stream of the Valley of the Lakes at this place joins with the larger and very serpentine stream of the Yauli valley. This valley has a flat and apparently level floor of half a mile in width, affording a carriage-road of two or three miles in length. There is a hacienda for smelting silver here; but having no letters, and but little time, (for the arriero begins very justly to complain that we are delaying him an unreasonable time upon the road,) I did not visit it.
Pachachaca is a small village of two hundred inhabitants. The people seem more industrious than those of the villages on the other side. There are fine crops of barley here, and we saw cabbages, onions, peaches, and eggs, in the shops. We were greater objects of curiosityin this place than we had been before. The people, I believe, took us for peddlers, and the woman from whom we got our supper and breakfast seemed offended because we would not sell her some candles, and importuned Gibbon for the sale of his straw hat. The men wore short woollen trousers, buttoned at the knee, together with, generally, two pair of long woollen stockings. The woollen articles of clothing are woven in this neighborhood, except the ponchos, which come from Tarma. Printed cottons from Lima sell for eighteen and three-quarter cents the vara, (33 inches;) a cup and saucer of the commonest ware are held at thirty-seven and a half cents, but purchasers are few; sewing-cotton, a dollar the pound. Shoes come from Jauxa; also candles and potatoes. Fuel is the "taquia," or dried cattle manure. Gibbon and I had occasion afterwards to laugh at our fastidiousness in objecting to a mutton-chop broiled upon a coal of cow-dung.
June 5.—We travelled down the valley about east. At about one and a half mile we passed a very curious-looking place, where a small stream came out of a valley to the northward and westward, and spread itself over a flat table-rock, soft and calcareous. It poured over this rock in a sort of horse-shoe cataract, and then spread over an apparently convex surface of this same soft rock, about two hundred and fifty yards wide, crossing the valley down which we were travelling. This rock sounded hollow under the feet of the mules, and I feared we should break through at every instant. I am confident it was but a thin crust; and, indeed, after crossing it, we observed a clear stream of water issuing from beneath it, and flowing into the road on the farther side. We saw another such place a little lower down, only the stream tumbled, in a variety of colored streaks, principally white, like salt, over the metallic-looking rock, into the rivulet below. I presume there must have been some volcano near here, and that this rock is lava, for it had all the appearance of having once been liquid.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.HACIENDA DE MAYOC.Pl. 3.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.HACIENDA DE MAYOC.Pl. 3.
Lt. Gibbon del.
Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.
HACIENDA DE MAYOC.Pl. 3.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.SAN MATEO.Pl. 4.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.SAN MATEO.Pl. 4.
Lt. Gibbon del.
Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.
SAN MATEO.Pl. 4.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.CORDILLERA FROM THE HIGHEST POINT OF THE ROUTE.Pl. 5.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.CORDILLERA FROM THE HIGHEST POINT OF THE ROUTE.Pl. 5.
Lt. Gibbon del.
Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.
CORDILLERA FROM THE HIGHEST POINT OF THE ROUTE.Pl. 5.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.MOUNT PUYPUY.Pl. 6.
Lt. Gibbon del.Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.MOUNT PUYPUY.Pl. 6.
Lt. Gibbon del.
Wagner & McGuigan's Lith. Phila.
MOUNT PUYPUY.Pl. 6.
The valley about two miles from Pachachaca is cut across by rocky hills. Here we turned to the northward and eastward. The country at first offered some pasturage, but became more barren as we advanced, only showing, now and then, some patches of barley. We travelled till noon on the left bank of the Yauli stream, when we crossed it by a natural bridge, at a little village of a few huts, called Saco. At half-past two, after a ride over a stony and dusty plain, bordered on each side by rocky mountains, we arrived at the bridge of Oroya. This is a chain suspension bridge, of about fifty yards in length, and two and a half in breadth, flung over the river of Jauxa, which is a tributary of the Ucayali. The Yauli stream, into which emptied the stream fromthe lakes at Morococha, joins this river here, and this is the connexion that I spoke of between those lakes, near the very summit of the Andes and the Atlantic ocean.
The bridge consisted of four chains, of about a quarter of an inch diameter, stretched horizontally across the river from strong stone-work on each side. These are interlaced with thongs of hide; sticks of about one and a half inch in diameter are laid across them and lashed down, forming a floor. Two other chains are stretched across about four feet above these, and connected with them by thongs of hide; these serve for balustrades, and would prevent a mule from jumping off. The bridge was about fifty feet above the water when we passed. It seemed very light, and rocked and swayed under the motion of the mules in crossing it. The heavy cargoes are taken off and carried over on the shoulders of the bridge-keeper and his assistants. The toll is twelve and a half cents the mule; and the same, the cargo. The bridge-ward seemed astonished, and somewhat annoyed, when I told him that one of the cargoes, which he left on the mule, was the heaviest I had, being a box filled with bags of shot, balls, and powder, together with the specimens of ore and rocks we had collected.
The river at this place turns from its southern course and runs to the eastward, by the village of Oroya, where we camped. This village contains about one hundred inhabitants, though we saw only five or six men; most of the male inhabitants being away to the harvest on the plains above. The women seemed nearly all to be employed in spinning wool; holding the bundle of wool in the left hand and spinning it out by a hanging broach. Very few of them spoke Spanish, but a corruptQuichua, or language of the Incas. We bought barley straw for the mules, and got a beef chupe, with eggs and roasted potatoes, for ourselves. We saw some small trees within the deserted enclosures where houses had been, bearing a very fragrant flower, something resembling the heliotrope, but much larger, and tinged with a reddish color. We also saw flocks of sheep, but got no mutton for dinner.
June 6.—Got under way at 9 a. m., steering N. N. E., and making a considerable ascent for about two miles. We then rode over a plain, with rolling hills on each side, covered with a short grass, giving pasturage to large flocks of sheep and some cows. The road then rose again, taking our column of mercury in the barometer out of sight, till half-past eleven, when we stood at the head of a ravine leading down to the valley of Tarma. The height of this spot above the level of the sea was eleven thousand two hundred and seventy feet. We rode down this ravine, north, for three-quarters of an hour, and at an angle to thehorizon of full thirty degrees. The road was filled with fragments of white calcareous rock, and the rocky hills on each side were pierced with many a cavern. When nearly at the foot, the plants and flowers familiar to us on the other side began to make their appearance, and in such quick succession, that it seemed that an hour's ride carried us over many a mile of the tedious ascent to the westward of the mountains. First appeared the hardy little flowers of the heights above San Mateo; then, the barley; the alfalfa; the Indian corn; beans; turnips; shrubs, becoming bushes; bushes, trees; flowers growing larger and gayer in their colors, (yellow predominating,) till the pretty little city of Tarma, embosomed among the hills, and enveloped in its covering of willows and fruit trees, with its long lawns of alfalfa (the greenest of grasses) stretching out in front, broke upon our view. The ride of to-day was a long and tiresome one, being mostly a bone-shaking descent; and we hailed with pleasure the sight of the little town as a resting place, after the tedious passage of the Cordillera, and felt that one of the inconveniences and perils of the expedition was safely and happily passed.
We arrived at 4 p. m., and rode straight to the house of a gentleman, Don Lorenzo Burgos, to whom I brought a letter of introduction from friend Shepherd, of Morococha; which letter contained the modest request that Don Lorenzo should place his house at my disposal. This he acceded to without hesitation, removing his sick wife, in spite of remonstrance, into another room, and giving us his hall for our baggage, and his chamber for our sleeping room. This I would not have acceded to, except that this is not Don Lorenzo's place of residence, but a new house which he is constructing here, and which he is only staying at for a few days till his wife is able to travel to their regular place of residence. There is no public house in the town, and it is customary to take travellers in. When I (next morning) presented a letter of introduction from the Bishop of Eretria to the Cura of Tarma, his first question was, "Where are you lodged?" And when I told him, he seemed annoyed, and said that I had not treated him properly in not coming to his house. Don Lorenzo gave us some dinner, and we slept well after the fatigues of the day.
Tarma, a town of some seven thousand inhabitants, belonging to the province ofPascoand department ofJunin, is beautifully situated in an amphitheatre of mountains, which are clothed nearly to the top with waving fields of barley. The valley in front, about half a mile wide, and two miles long, appears level, and is covered with the greenest and richest pasturage. Its borders are fringed with fruit trees;and the stream which waters it plunges, in a beautiful little cataract, of some thirty feet in height, over a ledge of rocks at the farther end. Its climate is delicious; and it is the resort of sickly people from Lima, and the cold and inclement mining districts, who find comfort and restoration in its pure atmosphere and mild and equable temperature. I was told, although the district contains nearly twenty thousand inhabitants, and its villages are close together, and easily accessible, that it could not, of itself, support a physician, and that the government had to appropriate the tax on spirits, and the surplus revenue of the bridge at Oroya, to this purpose. A young American physician, recently established in Tarma, gave me this account; but said that not even this had been sufficient to keep one here; that the custom had, therefore, fallen into desuetude, and that he was then engaged, with hope of success, in endeavoring to have this appropriation renewed and paid over to him.
I cannot vouch for this story. It has an apocryphal sound to me. I only know that it is a very healthy place, and that my medical friend is a person of repute there. When I proposed to carry him off with me, the ladies of my acquaintance raised a great outcry, and declared that they could not part with theirMedico. I think there is no apothecary's shop in Tarma, for I supplied the Doctor with some medicines, those which he had brought from Lima being nearly exhausted. I am satisfied, though there are so few diseases, that a good-looking young graduate of medicine, who would go there with money enough to buy him a horse, might readily marry a pretty girl of influential family, and soon get a practice that would enrich him in ten years. I afterwards knew a young American at Cerro Pasco, who, though not a graduate, and I believe scarcely a student of medicine, was in high repute as a doctor, and had as much practice as he could attend to; but who, like several of our countrymen whom I met abroad, was dissipated and reckless, and, as he himself expressed it, "slept with the pump."
The houses of Tarma are built of adobe; and the better sort are whitewashed within and without; floored with gypsum and tiled. The wood and iron work is of the rudest possible description, although the former, from the Montaña of Chanchamayo, is pretty and good. The doors of the house we are living in very much resemble "birds-eye maple." Some of the houses are partially papered, and carpeted with common Scotch carpeting. Most of them havepatios, or enclosed squares, within, and some of them flat roofs, with a parapet around them, where maize, peas, beans, and such things, are placed in the sun to dry.
Sunday is the great market-day, and the market-place is filled with country people, who come in to sell their manufactures of ponchos, blankets, shoes, hats, (made of the vicuña wool,) &c., and to buy coca, cotton goods, andagua diente, as well as to attend mass and get drunk. It is quite a busy and animated scene. The men are generally dressed in tall straw hats, ponchos, breeches, buttoned at the knee, and long woollen stockings; the women, in a blue woollen skirt, tied around the waist, and open in front, to show a white cotton petticoat, the shoulders covered with a mantle consisting of two or three yards of gay-colored plush, called "Bayeta de Castilla," or Spanish baize. Everything foreign in this country is called "de Castilla," (of Castile;) as in Brazil, it is called "da Rainha," (of the Queen.) The skirt of a lady of higher quality consists of a colored print, or mousseline. She rarely, unless dressed for company, takes the trouble to put on the body of her dress, which hangs down behind, and is covered with a gay shawl, passed around the bust, with the end thrown gracefully over the left shoulder. The hair, particularly on Sundays, is in perfect order; parted in the middle, and hanging down in two plaits behind. It is surmounted by a very neat, low-crowned straw-hat, the crown being nearly covered with a broad ribbon; and she is always "bien calzada," (well shod.) The women are generally large and well developed; not very pretty, but with amiable, frank, and agreeable manners; they have, almost invariably, a pleasant smile, with an open and engaging expression of countenance.
Religion flourishes in Tarma; and the Cura seems to have a busy time of it; though it is said he is cheated of half his rights in the way of marriage fees. I think that no day passed while we were here that there was not a "fiesta" of the church; for, although there are not more than twenty-five or thirty feast days in the year insisted upon by the church and the government, yet any piously-disposed person may get up one when he pleases. The manner seems to be this: A person, either from religious motives or ostentation, during or after Divine service in the church, approaches the altar, and, kissing one of its appendages, (I forget which,) proclaims his intention of becoming mayordomo or superintendent of such and such afiesta—generally that of the Saint after whom he is named, and thereupon receives the benediction of the priest. This binds him and his heirs to all the expenses of the celebration, which, in the great functions in Lima, may be set down at no small matter—the heaviest item being the lighting of one of those large churches from floor to dome with wax. The jewels and other adornments of the images borne in procession are generally borrowedfrom the devout Señoras of the higher and richer class; but I am told that many a person impoverishes his family for years by paying the expenses of one of these festivals.
Thefiestasin Tarma are generally celebrated with music, ringing of bells, firing of rockets, and dances of Indians. A dozen vagabonds are dressed in what is supposed to be the costume of the ancient Indians. This consists of a red blanket hanging from one shoulder, and a white one from the other, reaching nearly to the knee, and girded around the waist; the usual short blue breeches, with a white fringe at the knee; stockings of an indifferent color, and shoes or sandals of raw-hide, gathered over the toes with a draw-string, and tied around the ankles. The head-dress is a low crowned, broad-brimmed round hat, made of wool, and surrounded with a circlet of dyed feathers of the ostrich. Thus costumed, the party march through the streets, and stop every now and then to execute a sort of dance to the melancholy and monotonous music of a reed pipe, accompanied by a rude flat drum—both in the hands of the same performer. Each man has a stick or club, of hard wood, and a very small wooden or hide shield, which he strikes with the club at certain periods of the dance, making a low clattering in time with the music. They have also small bells, called "cascabeles," attached to the knees and feet, which jingle in the dance. They and their company of Indians and Mestizos smell very badly on a near approach. Connected with this there is a great deal of riot and drunkenness; and I felt annoyed that the church should patronize and encourage so demoralizing a procedure. The secular clergy of Peru, with a few honorable exceptions, have not a high character, if one is to believe the stories told of them by their own countrymen; and I had occasion to observe that the educated young men, as well of Chili as of Peru, generally spoke of them in terms of great contempt. I judge that the case is different with the clergy of the monastic orders, particularly the missionaries. Those I met with were evidently men of high character; and to their zeal, energy, and ability, Peru owes the conquest of by far the largest and richest part of the republic. It happens, unfortunately for the Peruvian character, that nearly all of these are foreigners—generally Spaniards and Italians.
June 7.—I suffered all day with violent pain in the head and limbs, from the ride of yesterday. These Peruvian saddles, though good for the beasts, and for riding up and down hill, stretch the legs so far apart as for a long time to give the unaccustomed rider severe pains in the muscles of the thighs; and I had to ride a large portion of the distance with my leg over the pommel, like a lady.
We paid off and parted with the arriero, Pablo Luis Arredondo. I did not find him so great a rascal as I expected; for, except the disposition to get all out of me he could, (which was very natural,) and an occasional growl, (which was also to be expected,) I had no reason to be dissatisfied with Luis. Ijurra was always quarrelling with him; but I think Ijurra has the fault of his countrymen generally, and wants the temper and patience necessary to manage ignorant people. By soft words and some bribery, I got along well enough with the old fellow; and he loaded his mules beyond their usual cargoes, and drove them along very well. I was frequently astonished at the difficulties they surmounted, loaded as they were. The usual load is two hundred and sixty pounds; and these animals of ours, with, I am sure, in some instances, a heavier load, and of a most incongruous and heterogeneous description, ascended hills and descended valleys which one would scarcely think an unloaded mule could travel over. Our riding mules were perfect treasures. Sure-footed, steady, strong, and patient, they bore us along easily and with comfort; and Gibbon says that he will part with his with tears, when we are compelled to give them up and take to the boats.
The market at Tarma is tolerably good, though the meat is badly butchered. Beef costs six cents a pound; a small leg of mutton, eighteen and three-quarter cents; good potatoes, nearly a dollar a bushel; cauliflowers, three small heads for twelve and a half cents; oranges, pineapples, and peaches are abundant and cheap, but not good; bread, very good, is baked in small loaves, by a Frenchman, four for twelve and a half cents; flour comes from Jauxa; eggs are ten cents a dozen.
We had a visit from the Cura, and went to see the sub prefect of the province, a gentleman named Mier, who promised me such assistance as I needed in my visit to Chanchamayo. Both of these gentlemen earnestly deprecated the idea of trusting myself and party among the "Chunchos" Indians on the other side of the river Chanchamayo, saying that they were very hostile to the whites, and dangerous. The Cura promised to look out for a servant for us. We had visits, also, from several gentlemen of the town; among them a Señor Cardenas, who gave me a copy of the memorial of Urrutia. All seemed much interested in my expedition to Chanchamayo, and hoped a favorable report.
June 11.—We rode about a league down the valley which leads to Chanchamayo, to the farm of General Otero, to whom we brought letters from Mr. Prevost, and Pasquel, bishop of Eretrea. We found this farm a different sort of affair from anything we had hitherto seen in this way in our travels. This is in a high state of cultivation, wellenclosed with mud walls, and in beautiful order. The General—a good looking, farmer-like old gentleman—met us with great cordiality, and showed us over the premises. He has a very large house, with all the necessary offices attached, which he built himself. Indeed, he said he had made the farm; for when he purchased it, it was a stony and desolate place, and he had expended much time, labor, and money on it. There were two gardens: one for vegetables and fruit, and one for flowers. They were both in fine order. The fruits were peaches of various kinds, apples, strawberries, almonds, and some few grapes. The flowers were principally roses, pinks, pansies, jessamines, and geraniums. There were a few exotics, under bell-glasses. Both fruit and flowers were of rather indifferent quality, but much better than one would expect to see in so elevated and cold a situation. The nights here, particularly in the early morning, are quite cold.
This is the harvest season, and the General was gathering his crop of maize. About twenty peons or laborers were bringing it in from the fields, and throwing it down in piles in a large court-yard, while boys and women were engaged in "shucking" it. In one corner of the square, under a snug little shed attached to one of the barns, with stone seats around it, sat the General's three daughters, sewing, and probably superintending the "shucking." They were fair, sweet-looking girls. The General had a tray of glasses, with someItalia(a cordial made of a Muscatel grape that grows in the province of Ica, and hence called Ica brandy) and paper cigars, brought out for us; and the whole concern had a home look that was quite pleasing.
I cannot give a good idea of farming in this country, for want of information of the value of land; this depending so entirely on its situation and condition. The mountain sides are so steep, and the valleys so rocky, that I imagine there is no great deal of cultivable land in all this district, and therefore it is probably high. According to Gen. Otero, land here is measured by "tongos," which is a square of thirty-three varas. (A vara is thirty-three English inches.) Three tongos make a "yuntada," or as much as it is calculated that a yoke of oxen can plough in a day. About half an arroba, or twelve and a half pounds of seed, is planted to the tongo. In maize, the yield is between forty-five and fifty for one. Wheat yields about forty for one, but is so subject to the rust as to be an uncertain crop, and is therefore little cultivated. The price of maize is five dollars thecargaor mule-load, of two hundred and sixty pounds. From these data it appears, then, that an acre will yield about forty-three bushels, which is worth one dollar and twenty-five cents the bushel. Quantities of barley arecultivated on the mountain sides, but the grain does not come to perfection, and it is generally cut green for fodder; though the General says that it is not good for that, the straw being coarse and hard. Potatoes are a good crop; they are worth now in Tarma one dollar and fifty cents the hundred pounds, and in times of scarcity have been known to run up as high as seven dollars. One of the principal articles of food of the laborers of this country is "cancha," or toasted maize. They mix a little lime with the grains before putting them in the hot ashes, which makes them whiter and improves their flavor. It is really very sweet and good, and I liked it better than the green corn roasted, which is such a favorite dish with us.Chicha, a fermented liquor, is also made from Indian corn, and much drunk by all classes. The General gave us some that he had prepared and bottled himself. It was very good, rose-colored, and sparkled like Champagne. He told us that our corn, which he called "mais morocha," was not so good as this for making either cancha or chicha; this being softer and sweeter.
We visited the stables, which were very clean, and paved, and contained some ten or fifteen fine-looking young horses; and there were thirty or forty more, mares and colts, in a spacious corral or enclosure near, with an American farrier from Tarma attending to some of them. There is also a neat little chapel occupying a corner of the "patio," with the inscription over the door, "Domus mea, domus orationis est." It was neatly papered and carpeted, and had colored prints of the "Stations" hung around the walls. The altar-piece was a figure of our Lady of Mercy, with the figures of St. Francis and St. Peter on each side; these Saints being the patrons of the general and his lady, Don Francisco and Doña Pedronilla. The General's manners were exceedingly courteous and affable; and he possessed that suavity and gentleness of bearing that seems to me always to characterize the military man of high rank when in retirement. The whole establishment reminded me of one of our best kept Virginia farms, where the owner had inherited the homestead of his father, and was in easy circumstances.
June 12.—Dined with our countryman, Dr. Buckingham, and a couple of young ladies, one of whom seemed to be his housekeeper. The dinner was after the Peruvian fashion: first, a sort of thick soup; then, roasted ribs of mutton, served with salad; this succeeded by a dish of stewed Guinea pigs, mixed with a variety of vegetables, and which would have been very good but for the addition of a quantity ofaji, or red pepper, which made it unendurable to the unaccustomed palate; winding up with the invariable chupe, and the invariable dessert ofdulces, or sweetmeats. A Limenian never thinks of taking water during dinner, and always eats sweetmeats after dinner, that he may then safely take water; so that "Tomar dulces, para beber agua" is a sort of dietetic proverb with them.
June 13.—Rode out on the Oroya road, with the intention of visiting a cave, or what is reported to be a subterraneous passage made by the Incas, and reaching as far as Jauxa, twenty-seven miles; but, after riding about five miles, we determined that we were too late to explore the cave for that day, and meeting Richards, from Morococha, we turned back. I suspect that this cave is nothing more than the cañon, or opening, of some long-deserted mine.
June 14.—Rode out to the southward, in the direction of Jauxa. This valley, which rises very rapidly, is thickly settled, and well cultivated. Road bad. Another valley debouches from this, about four miles above Tarma, to the southward and eastward, leading to the Montaña of Vitoc.
June 15.—Had a long visit from General Otero. The vivacious old gentleman discoursed very pleasantly. He said that it was difficult to get at the population of the town proper, the census being generally taken of the Doctrina, or district over which the Cura had religious jurisdiction; that this was about ten or twelve thousand, of which one-twelfth part were pure white, about one-half Mestizos, (descendants of whites and Indians,) and the balance Indians, there being very few negroes. I asked him to account for the number of blind people we had noticed in the streets. He said that most of the blind people came from Jauxa, in which country much wheat and barley are produced; that they sifted these grains, and got rid of the chaff by throwing them up in the air, and he believed that the blindness arose from the irritation caused by the chaff and barbs flying into the eyes of the people who sifted.
Healso said that he thought I should not attempt to cross the Chanchamayo amongst the Indians, for that I would not be able to defend myself against their attacks; but thought that, if I wished to descend the Ucayali, I had better take a more southern tributary, called the Pangoa; (this is Biedma's route, by Andamarca and Sonomora;) that there the Indians were not so much irritated against the whites, and that the river was known to be navigable for canoes, for he himself had known a friar of Ocopa who, in 1817, had descended it for the conversion of the Indians of the Ucayali, and had afterwards established a missionary station at Andamarca, where the Indians came at stated periods to be baptized and receive presents of hatchets, knives,beads, &c., but that, on the occasion of the war in 1824, the supplies had been stopped, and the Indians would come no more. He, as did the sub-prefect, liked my idea of ascending from the mouth of the Ucayali, with a properly-equipped Indian force, and looking into the navigability of thePerenéand Chanchamayo that way.
The latitude of Tarma, by mean of Mer. altitudes of α and βCentauri, is 11° 25' 05" S.
June 16.—We left Tarma for the Chanchamayo. This is the first time I have applied to authority for the means of locomotion. I did it inadvertently, and was sorry for it; for, though I would probably have been cheated in the price, yet I should not have been the cause of injustice and oppression. I had said to the sub-prefect, a few days before, that I wanted the means of transportation for some baggage to Chanchamayo, which he promised to furnish me. Yesterday I went to ask for it for to-day, and he referred me to the governor of the district, who was present, and who told me that he would have what I required—viz: two asses and a saddle mule, with two peons—ready by to-morrow morning. Accordingly, this morning he sent for me, and presented to me the owner of the mule, the owner of the asses, and the two peons. The wages of these were to be four reals, or half a dollar, a day; and I paid each three dollars in advance. To the governor I paid a dollar for each ass, and two for the mule, with the understanding that I was to pay as much more on my return. The peons were then lectured on their duties, and sent round to my house with an escort of half a dozenalguaziles, or constables, armed with sticks, to prevent their escaping or getting drunk before the start. The asses and mules were also sent round under a similar guard, so that my patio seemed filled with a clamorous multitude, who created such a confusion that I had to turn out all but my own people. I ordered these to load up; but they said that the owners of the asses had sent nolassos, or thongs, to bind on the burdens; and I soon discovered that there was a general unwillingness for the job, and that the governor had pressed the animals into the service against the will of the owners.
Strong efforts were made to get the mule away from me. The woman of the house, who, it appears, was a sister of the owner, advised me not to take it; and said that it was a bad, vicious animal, that would do me a mischief. I was surprised at this, as he looked particularly docile; and I directed my new servant (one recommended by the Cura, and who looked twice as vicious as the mule) to mount and ride him around the patio. The fellow grinned maliciously, and proved my judgment correct. Finding this would not do, the owner (who had put hissister up to making this attempt) then came forward, and said I must pay him half a dollar more, as the governor had kept back that much of the price. This being "no go," he tried to steal away his mule while our backs were turned; but being prevented, he went off, got drunk in about fifteen minutes, and came back maudlin; embracing, kissing, and weeping over his mule, crying in piteous tones "Mi macho, mi macho," (my mule, my mule.) We shoved him aside and rode off, followed, I have no doubt, by the curses of the community.
This was all very annoying to me. I afterwards mentioned these circumstances to the commandant of the fort at Chanchamayo, telling him how much I would prefer to pay double price and get voluntary service. He said that my sympathies were all thrown away upon these people, that Imustgo to the governors for the means of transportation; for that the Indians would not let me have their beasts at any price; and related instances of his having to use threats, and even force, to induce a sulky Indian to give him and his beast food and shelter when in the Cordillera, and the approach of night made it impossible to go on. Several travellers in these parts have also told me that they have been compelled to shoot the poultry of an Indian, who with a large stock, would refuse to sell at any price; but who, after the thing was done, would good humoredly accept a fair value.
Ijurra also related instances of oppression and tyranny on the part of the governors, particularly in the province of Mainas, where commerce is carried on by transportation of the goods on the backs of Indians. A travelling merchant goes to the governor and says, "I have such and such a cargo; I want so many Indians to transport it." The governor, generally a white or Mestizo, sends for theCuraca, (the lineal hereditary governor of the tribe of Indians of that district, who has great authority, and without whose assistance the whites probably could not govern at all,) and orders him to have so many Indians detailed for a journey. The Curaca drums them up, directing them to toast their corn and prepare their "fiambre" (food for the road) for a journey of so many leagues; and they are taken from their occupations and sent off, for probably many days, at a pay of anything that the governor may direct.
If a man wishes to build a house or open a farm, he may be supplied with laborers for six months, at a hire, per month, of as many yards of cotton cloth as will make each a shirt and pair of trousers; the patron or master furnishing them with food; but, as may be imagined, this is of the coarsest and commonest description that will support life.
It would seem that men could never improve under a system of such absolute slavery as this; yet to give them liberty, is to abandon them and return them to a state of barbarity, shutting out all prospect of improvement; and the only hope seems to be in the justice and moderation of the rulers—a slim hope here.
We got off at noon; stopped at the "chacra" of Gen. Otero, and received a letter of introduction to the commandant of the fort. When the old gentleman saw our new servant "Mariano," he crossed himself most devoutly, and ejaculated "Satanas!" He then told us that this was a notoriously bad boy, whom nobody had been able to manage, but that we, being strangers and military men, might get along with him by strictness and severity; and he gave the boy a lecture upon his duties and the faithful performance of them.
A mile and a half beyond Gen. Otero's is the town of Acobamba. I judge that it contains twelve or fifteen hundred inhabitants; but it is situated in a thickly-settled district, and the "Doctrina" is said to be more populous than that of Tarma. Six more miles brought us to Palca, a straggling town of about one thousand inhabitants. We merely passed through, and a mile further on "brought up" at the chacra of Don Justo Rojas, to whom I had a letter from Lizarralde, the administrator at Morococha. Don Justo was engaged in extracting, by boiling, the juice of the rhatany root for an apothecary of Lima. He supplied us with a capital supper of chicken soup and boiled eggs, with alfalfa for the beasts. He also sold us, from his establishment in town, sugar and bread. We pitched the tent in an old corn-field, and slept delightfully. Tent-pegs for this country should be of iron. Although those we used were made of the hardest wood that could be found in Lima, we had used them all up by this time, beating off their heads by driving them with a hatchet into the hard and stony ground.
Don Justo's is the last chacra in the valley, which now narrows, and allows no room for cultivation. Though going down hill by the barometer, we were evidently crossing a chain of mountains, which the stream at the bottom of the valley has saved us the trouble of ascending and descending, by cleaving a way through for itself, and leaving the mountains on either hand towering thousands of feet above our heads. The ride was the wildest we have yet had; the road sometimes finding room along the borders of the river, and then ascending nearly to the top of the hills, and diminishing the foaming and thundering stream to a noiseless, silver thread. The ascents and descents were nearly precipitous; and the scene was rugged, wild, and grand beyond description.
We saw some miserable huts on the road, and met a few asses carrying reeds and poles from Chanchamayo. It seemed a providence that we did not meet these at certain parts of the road, where it is utterly impossible for two beasts to pass abreast, or for one to turn and retreat; and the only remedy is to tumble one off the precipice, or to drag him back by the tail until he reaches a place where the other can pass. Von Tschudi relates an instance of his shooting a mule which met him at one of these places.
We met with a considerable fright in this way to-day. We were riding in single file along one of these narrow ascents, where the road is cut out of the mountain side, and the traveller has a perpendicular wall on one hand, and a sheer precipice of many hundreds of feet upon the other. Mr. Gibbon was riding ahead. Just as he was about to turn a sharp bend of the road the head of a bull peered round it, on the descent. When the bull came in full view he stopped, and we could see the heads of other cattle clustering over his quarters, and hear the shouts of the cattle-drivers, far behind, urging on their herd. I happened to be abreast of a slight natural excavation, or hollow, in the mountain side, and dismounting I put my shoulder against my mule's flank and pressed her into this friendly retreat; but I saw no escape for Gibbon, who had passed it. The bull, with lowered crest, and savage, sullen look, came slowly on, and actually got his head between the perpendicular rock and the neck of Gibbon's mule. I felt a thrill of agony, for I thought my companion's fate was sealed. But the sagacious beast on which he was mounted, pressing her haunches hard against the wall, gathered her feet close under her and turned as upon a pivot. This placed the bull on the outside, (there was room to pass, though I did not believe it,) and he rushed by at the gallop, followed in single file by the rest of the herd. I cannot describe the relief I experienced. Gibbon, who is as gallant and fearless as man can be, said "It is of no use to attempt to disguise the fact—I was badly scared."
At 2 p. m., we arrived at a place called Matichacra, where there was a single hut, inhabited by a woman and her child; the husband having gone to Cerro Pasco to exhibit some specimens of gold ore which he had found here. The woman was afflicted with an eruption on her face, which she thought was caused by the metallic character of the earth around, particularly the antimonial. She took a knife, and, digging earth from the floor of her hut, washed it in a gourd, and showed us particles of metal like gold sticking to the bottom. I showed some of this earth to General Otero, who pronounced thatthere was no gold in it; but Lieutenant Maury, who examined some that I brought home with a powerful magnifier, has declared that there was. The mountains have an exceedingly metallic appearance, and the woman said that there were still in the neighborhood traces of the mining operations of the Spaniards.
About a mile and a half above Matichacra commenced the steep regular descent of the mountain range, and from just above it we could discern where the valley debouched upon an apparent plain, though bounded and intersected by distant mountains, bearing and ranging in different directions. This place we judged to be the "Montaña." We stopped an hour at Matichacra, (Gourd Farm, from half a dozen gourd vines growing near the house,) and made a chupe with a leg of mutton we had bought the night before at Palca. We saw a few patches of Indian corn on the side of the mountain opposite, and the tops of the mountains are clad with small trees. We passed on five miles further, and camped on a level plat near the banks of the stream, with bushes and small trees growing around us.
June 18.—This was the longest and hardest day's ride. The road was very bad; rocky and rough where it descended the river, and steep and difficult where it ascended the mountain side. We thought that the engineer who planned and constructed the road had frequently "taken the bull by the horns," and selected the worst places to run his road over; and that he would have done much better had he occasionally have thrown a bridge across the stream, and led the road along the flank of the mountains on the other side. In seven and a half miles we arrived atUtcuyacu, (cotton water,) the first hacienda where we saw sugar-cane, yucca, pine-apples, and plantains. It had just been opened, and nothing yet had been sold from it.
The road, by which we had descended the valley of Chanchamayo, turned at this place sharp to the right, and faced the mountains that divide this valley from that of the Rio Seco. We were near the junction of the two valleys, but a rock had fallen from the hills above and blocked up the road on which we were travelling, so that we had to cross the mountain on our right and get into the other valley. The ascent was steep, and trying to man and beast. It is called the "Cuesta de Tangachuca," or "Hill of take care of your hat," and is about three miles in length. The road, after passing through a thick forest, brought us out upon a bald eminence, the termination of the spur of the Andes that divides the two valleys. The rivers Seco and Chanchamayo unite at its base and flow off through a valley, rapidly widening out, covered with forests, and presenting an appearance entirely distinct from therocky and stern sterility that characterizes the country above. This is the "Montaña" of which I had thought so much. I was wofully disappointed in its appearance. I had taken the impression that I should behold a boundless plain, alternating with forest and prairie, covered with waving grass, and with a broad and gentle river winding its serpentine course through it, between banks rich with the palm and plantain. In place of this, the view from the mountain top showed a country broken still into mountain and valley, (though on a much smaller scale than above,) shaggy with trees and undergrowth of every description, and watered by a small stream, still foaming and roaring over its rocky bed.
We descended the hill by a very circuitous and precipitous path, most of us on foot, though it may be ridden over, for Mr. Gibbon did ride over the worst parts of it, and only dismounted where a fallen tree made an obstruction that he could not pass. The descent brought us to the rocky bed of the Rio Seco, crossing which we were clear of the eastern chain of the Andes and in the Montaña of Chanchamayo.
As far as the traveller is concerned there are not, on the route we have travelled, two ranges of the Andes—that is, he has not to ascend and descend one range, and then ascend and descend another. From the time he crosses the Cordillera at Antarangra, his progress is downward till he reaches the plain. Really there are two. The streams from the first, or western range, have broken their way through the second, making deep gorges, at the bottom of which the road generally runs, and leaves the peaks of the second range thousands of feet above the head of the traveller.
A league from the crossing of the Rio Seco, we passed a bad and broken bridge, that spans a small stream called "Punta Yacu," coming down a valley from the southward, and halted at the hacienda of Don Jose Manuel Cardenas, the first of the Montaña, where we camped for the night.
June 19.—Six miles of travel brought us to the fort of San Ramon. The road is a black mud bridle-path through the woods, much obstructed with the roots and branches of trees, but level. Comparatively few rocks are seen after leaving Cardenas. We were kindly received by the commandant, Don Juan Noel, a fine-looking young man, Captain of Frigate and Lieutenant Colonel in the Army, and his officers, Major Umeres and Lieutenant ——.
Fort San Ramon is, by Mer. alt. of "γ Crusis," in latitude 11°.07 S. Its height above the level of the sea, as given by barometer, is two thousand six hundred and ten feet.
From the first of March to the last of August the climate is delightful; but the heavy and almost continuous rains of the other six months of the year make it disagreeable, but not unhealthy.
As we are now near the foot of the mountains, on the eastern slope, I give a table of the distances and elevations of various points on the route. TheB. P.opposite some of the elevations show that these were indicated by the temperature of boiling water:
The barometer gave the height of a point, four miles above Tarma, at eleven thousand two hundred and seventy feet. So that there is a descent in these four miles of distance of one thousand five hundred and thirty-five feet. The ascent, however, between Acchahuarcu and the top of the hill on which we observed, at the Pass of Antarangra, is steeper than this, being three thousand three hundred and fifty-eight feet in six miles.
From Yanacoto, on the western slope of the Andes, to the top of the Pass, is fifty-nine miles; from the top of the Pass to Fort San Ramon, on the eastern slope, which is two hundred and seventy feet higher than Yanacoto, is eighty-eight miles. This gives the ascent of the Andes, on its western slope, at 232 feet to the mile, and on its eastern slope at 152.