Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate Novara Volume Iii Part 19

The Peruvian Government does not seem to realize the calamity impending over the country on the exhaustion of the guano beds, which would dry up one of its princ.i.p.al sources of revenue. Certainly it seems impossible to make a more unwise use of the immense sums which are flowing into the State treasury. Nothing is done for making roads or railways so as to furnish intercourse with the fertile provinces of the interior, or to raise and encourage agriculture or commerce. Just as this revenue does not result from the energy or industrial activity of the people, it is expended without any object of utility to show for it. The Government pockets the dues as a monopoly, and expends the sums thus obtained in avaricious schemes of aggrandizement, or warlike expeditions against Ecuador and Bolivia, which keep the country in perpetual hot water, and only add to its burthens. The guano duties go in gunpowder! Lightly won, as lightly gone!

During the nine days of our voyage between Valparaiso and Callao de Lima there were some musicians on board, who gave us a concert on deck every evening. As we left the Chincha Islands some frolicsome young Peruvians, disregarding the discord of the flute and violin, and unmindful of the timeless tuneless tw.a.n.ging of the two harps, got up a dance.

In the course of the night we ran into Callao harbour, and when I came on deck, in the cool of the morning, I found we were already lying at anchor in this s.p.a.cious and secure port. The tradition that with a calm sea and a clear sky it is possible to perceive the ruins of the old town, with its houses and church-towers, which sank here suddenly in 1746 by the shock of an earthquake, has survived to the present day, and is told to every new-comer, who greedily swallows it down, though not one of the narrators has ever beheld the marvel with his own eyes! Earthquakes, indeed, are by no means so frequent as at the beginning of the present century, when it was rare for a fortnight to elapse without at least one _temblore_ or horizontal oscillation. The vertical shocks (_terra-motos_), the most dangerous kind of earthquake, have not occurred here since 1828. The season at which earthquakes most frequently occur are the months of March, April, and September, whence the latter month has received from the people the jocular name of "_Se tiembla!_" (it trembles!) One Peruvian who has long occupied himself with scientific observations has repeatedly witnessed that a magnet, freely suspended, regularly lost its attractive powers a few minutes before each shock, and that a piece of steel held by the magnetic force fell to the ground. If this be confirmed by a series of observations the magnet might ultimately become a sort of earthquake-monitor.

The Callao of the present day is a dirty, ugly hole, with narrow streets, and low houses built princ.i.p.ally of mud and cane, with flat roofs. Only a few of the houses of foreigners, erected out of hearing of the hubbub of the port, form a grateful exception. The entire population will be about 20,000 souls.

The most interesting building of the port is undoubtedly the new Custom House with 31 colossal magazines, each capable of containing six to eight entire s.h.i.+ps' freights. I repeatedly heard complaints made of the slovenliness of the attendants, in consequence of which it frequently happened that days elapsed ere goods, paid for, were delivered out of bond. The warehouse charge is very small, and consists chiefly of stamp-duties, which are imposed on the money paid for goods. The trade of Callao is apparently on the increase, and, considering the productiveness of the country, would be even greater, were internal order restored, when peace and confidence would follow in its train.

As I had to prosecute my journey northwards by the next steamer, I hastened on to Lima, so as to satisfy my curiosity as to this the most important city of Peru in modern days. A few hours after my arrival in Callao, I found myself on the road to the "City of the Kings."[131] Only a few years back the journey from Callao to Lima, though only six English miles, was an exceedingly arduous and even dangerous undertaking. The road lay through a shadeless desert of deep sand, between uncultivated fields and low scrubs, and was absolutely unsafe owing to attacks of robbers. Now it is a frequent excursion, a tolerably good railroad performing the distance in about half an hour.

By the kindness of Mr. Wilhelm Brauns, the Consul-General of Hamburg, and head of the distinguished English house Huth, Gruning, and Co.,[132] to whom I brought letters of introduction, and who was most kindly in waiting for me. I was speedily and pleasantly conveyed from the station in Lima, to take up my quarters in his house till I took my leave. Owing to this fortunate event, I found myself unexpectedly brought into the very thick of the very best German society. Nowhere in the course of many years of travel in various countries, all over the globe, did I meet with more cordial hospitality, or a more delightful reception, than during my 19 days' stay in the "City of the Kings."

On our way from the station to the house of Mr. Brauns, I remarked that the houses in every part of the city that we pa.s.sed were painted with variegated stripes, and heard, to my intense astonishment, that, in consequence of a recent decree of the Government, every householder in each quarter was ordered, with a view to facilitating the identification of their houses, to paint them of a colour corresponding with the coloured official plans of the city! Accordingly in one quarter all the houses were green, in another yellow, in a third white, in a fourth reddish, and in a fifth sky-blue. As in all Spanish American cities exposed to earthquakes, most of the houses in Lima also are but one storey high. The larger buildings are constructed of sun-dried bricks or fire clay, the smaller of cane set up double, with the s.p.a.ce between filled up with clay, and the whole whitewashed. Their most singular feature is the flat roofs, which consist of a layer of cane and straw mats, which, for better security, occasionally have a coating of clay. Thus an open s.p.a.ce (_Azotea_), surrounded by bal.u.s.trades, is secured, which is used as a playground by children, and serves as a promenade for the grown-up portion of the community. Some of the windows communicate with the roof by a sort of trap-door, which instead of sashes of gla.s.s has shutters of wood, which communicate with the rooms beneath by a long cord, so that they can be opened or shut from below at pleasure. Many of the chambers in the interior of the house get light and air solely through these apertures (called _Ventana de Teatinas_, because first introduced by the Theatine monks), while windows properly so-called are less numerous, and when looking towards the street are usually provided with large, broad, sometimes richly-gilt iron shutters. We saw these curious cords for opening and shutting the trap-doors in the roof hanging down in the middle of even elegantly-furnished apartments, and not even the circ.u.mstance of being made of silk prevented their having a peculiar and ungraceful effect.

The mode of constructing the houses, together with the elegant ornamentation of the open courts (_pato_) of the interior, speedily remind the stranger that he is in a place where rain (at least according to Northern ideas) is an unknown phenomenon, since one single, even down-pour must inevitably do immense damage in the Lima of the present day. During the winter months, however, as they are called, viz. June to November, fogs (_garuas_) are very frequent, which, albeit light, are sufficiently penetrating thoroughly to soak the pedestrian or horseman who happens to be surprised by them. I have myself repeatedly experienced in Lima fogs of such density, that it was quite practicable to count each separate drop. During these winter months, fine, clear days free of all cloud are comparatively rare; but the statement one occasionally hears, that for five months together the sun is invisible in Lima, is an exaggeration. The temperature of Lima is much lower than we could expect from a city within 12 degrees of the Equator, and seems to be affected princ.i.p.ally by the proximity of the eternal snows of the Andes, and the prevailing atmospheric currents. The thermometer never rises higher than 85.8 Fahr., nor falls below 68.2 Fahr. The average temperature during the hot season is 77, and during the cold 63.5 Fahr. Such a climate renders fires superfluous, and it is more habit than necessity that induces some Spanish families to carry about copper or iron pans (_Brasero_) filled with live coal, with which to warm their hands or feet.

The exteriors and internal equipments of the dwellings are very simple and devoid of ornament, only a few of the older buildings, such, for instance, as the house of Torre Tagle, near San Pedro, forming the exception. Among the architectural decorations, which preserve to the present day the tradition of the glories of the Peruvian kingdom, one may marvel at majestic designs and beautiful mosaics, which even in their ruin tell of the magnificent luxury that was once indulged in here.

The streets are wide and tolerably regular, but the absence of gutters and the wretched foundation of the roadway prevent their being used by carriages or hors.e.m.e.n, or by pedestrians even more than they can help. The open ditches at either side are full of filth and animal impurities, which are continually being thrown in, and but for the services of numerous carrion crows (_cathartes f[oe]tens_), who perform the duties of scavengers, Lima, owing to the supineness of the native authorities, would be one of the filthiest and most unhealthy cities in South America. But the _gallinazos_, as these black-headed birds are called by the natives, although lazy and unwieldy, nevertheless are in such immense numbers here, that they suffice to keep the streets comparatively free from putrescent odours. Everywhere, even in the thick of places of public resort, one sees these birds, which no one injures on account of their usefulness, and which even the rising generation never think of disturbing in their disgusting avocations, hopping about upon the bare ground, and gorging themselves on the garbage around.

One of the greatest improvements to the city is its almost universal illumination by gas, which in the evening imparts a peculiar charm to the streets and fas.h.i.+onable shops of Lima, and enables them, in this particular at least, to vie with those of the capitals of Europe.

The largest buildings in Lima are, as we might expect from a country conquered and colonized by Spaniards, the churches and monasteries, of which there are in this capital no fewer than eighty. Many of these Spanish memorials, of a religious epoch more bigoted than sincere, are at present decayed, and even those which are still preserved in something like good order fail to charm the eye by any graces of architecture or majestic simplicity in their interior fittings up. The Cathedral even, which takes up almost the entire east side of the chief square, is no exception to this rule, and, though it was 90 years in erection, is after all a very indifferent edifice. The interior is lofty and s.p.a.cious, but owing to the choir having its proportions curtailed by a wide altar in the midst, one perceives on entering the church only the smaller half, so that the impression is destroyed, which, but for this interposed erection, would undoubtedly be made by the high altar, richly overlaid with gold and silver, seen through the vista of the entire building. The ornaments, the sacred vessels, and censers used in performing ma.s.s are exceedingly rich and valuable, but are too much overlaid to please an aesthetic taste. In the catacombs of the Cathedral repose the remains of Francisco Pizarro.

Few strangers omit to visit this spot, and usually feel as much surprised as pleased at finding offered them for sale by the sacristan, various sorts of relics of the renowned conqueror of Peru, though all cannot hope to be so fortunate as an English lady at Lima, who informed me with all gravity that she had purchased from a guide a slipper taken from the coffin of Pizarro. Should this mania for relics on the part of visitors, and readiness to humour it on the part of vergers, continue unchecked, there will remain ere long in the catacombs only an empty sh.e.l.l, in which once lay the celebrated Conquistador. Perhaps, though, the speculative sacristan contents himself with gratifying the wishes of curiosity-loving visitants, by means similar to those of the artful cicerone who accompanies the enthusiastic stranger in his rambles among the ruins of cla.s.sic antiquity.

The monastery of San Francisco is more worth notice for its immense extent, which equals in size many an old imperial walled city of Suabia, than for elegance of style or tasteful artistic interior. The facade, painted in various colours, and overlaid with ornament, resembles by far more a Buddha temple than a Roman Catholic church. The corridors are the finest part of the building, their wooden ceilings being very richly carved. On all the walls of the pa.s.sages are suspended drawings ill.u.s.trative of the lives of various holy men, which, however, singular to say, are hung with their faces to the wall, and are only turned round on appointed festivals to charm the eyes of believers!

The church is very roomy within, but quite bare of ornament. The sacristan with evident pride directed our attention to San Benito, a "black" saint, who was held in high esteem by the negroes, probably on account of his colour. Quite close to the monastery is the "Casa de Ejercicios," whither the monks repair at certain periods of the year to perform the prescribed religious exercises. The cells here have a more comfortless look than in the cloister proper. A bed-frame with a skin stretched upon it, a hard stool, a plain table, a crucifix, and a human skull, comprise the entire inventory. The latter, the cranium of a departed brother, was covered with numerous aids to religious meditation, some written, some carved on the substance of the bone.

The lay-brother who escorted us round had not long been a denizen of this gloomy monastic abode. Though still very young, he was leaving behind him a tolerably enlarged experience of the world. Starting as a gold-digger in California, he became a gambler and speculator, when he quickly lost all he had so laboriously wrested from the soil, and returned to Lima, where, more for the sake of change and comfort than for any special vocation or imperious spiritual necessity, he had entered the order of Franciscans.

His temperament being much more that of a man of the world than a monk, he must have felt himself sorely hampered by the restrictions of monastrism, were it not for the lax morality which is the standard of convent life in the capital of Peru; but the monk's cowl is in Lima not only the attire of humility and resignation, it is likewise the cloak for all manner of licentiousness and hypocrisy--the "_surtout_" which conceals many a lapse from virtue!

The monastery of San Pedro was the wealthiest in Lima, so long as it remained the property of the Jesuits. When, in 1773, the order went forth for the suppression of the Order throughout South America, it was not executed without the Spanish viceroy's cheris.h.i.+ng certain secret hopes of obtaining large riches. The Jesuits, however, on this occasion vindicated their reputation for subtlety, which has become proverbial among mankind.

When the inventory was taken, nothing but empty boxes were to be found, and the most strict investigations and inquiries led to no more favourable result.

Among the hospitals which we visited, that of San Andres deserves foremost notice for its size and comprehensiveness. It has room for 600 patients, who are tended by 50 _S[oe]urs de la Charite_, the majority of whom are French. The yellow fever, which, introduced in 1852 by immigrants, penetrated deep into the interior, though of a milder type, had of late carried off numerous victims, and indeed had seriously weakened the hygienic good name[133] of Lima; the small-pox also had annually committed fearful ravages; for vaccination is not made imperative by law, and inoculation is therefore neglected. Besides the hospital of St. Andrew, there are others for female patients, for the military, for incurables and imbeciles, an asylum for orphans,[134] and one for foundlings.[135]

The best managed hospital apparently is that of Santa Anna, the wards of which are roomy, light, and airy, and make up about 350 beds. On the other hand, a portion of the above hospital set apart for those mentally afflicted, as also the regular Lunatic Asylum (_casa de Locos_), were in a state of filth and neglect, that are a positive disgrace to the present century. It is, in fact, a singular consideration that in every quarter of the globe men have only now begun to bethink them of their duties to those unhappy fellow-creatures, whose wretched lot should have commanded their most active sympathies! The reform of hospitals, and even of prisons and penitentiaries, had long been carried out in Europe, before asylums especially designed for the treatment of lunatics were projected. I must not, however, omit to add, in justice to the philanthropic society (_Sociadad de Beneficiencia_), to whose management the whole of the hospitals and poor-houses of the capital are intrusted, that a new Lunatic Asylum was in course of construction, the cost of which will amount to 85,000 dollars (about 17,800).

The _Hospital de los Locos_ (Hospital for the Insane) in the Cercado is all on the ground-floor, with chambers used at once for sitting-room, dining-room, and bed-chamber, but with accommodation for about 200 patients. Twenty of the cells are set apart exclusively for refractory patients. The inst.i.tution is in charge of Dr. Ulloa, one of the most skilful of the native physicians, who studied both in France and England.

The patients are tended by the Grey Sisterhood, which has only recently reached the country.

The old university buildings, on what formerly was called the Square of the Inquisition, now named Independence Square, are at present only used for festivities, examinations, conferring of degrees, &c. &c., while the different lectures are read in various buildings. I visited the School of Medicine, of which at that time Dr. Cajetano Herredia was rector, a gentleman more respectable for his zealous discharge of duty than by his scientific attainments. There are some good lecture-rooms, a chemical laboratory, a small museum, consisting mainly of pathological specimens, and a very fair library, which boasts several really valuable and little-known prints and books, especially such as relate to the history of Peru. One of the Professors, Don Antonio Raimondi, a Neapolitan by birth, bids fair to raise the reputation of the School of Medicine of Lima by his extensive knowledge and excellent mode of instruction. This gentleman teaches several branches of Natural History, and, during the short period he has been in Lima, has already given practical proof of his activity in a variety of fields.

Unfortunately Professor Raimondi, with a number of his pupils, was absent on an excursion for practical scientific instruction, so that I was deprived of the opportunity of making his personal acquaintance. In his studio I saw two very remarkable skulls of Indians, which, owing to artificial pressure, had a.s.sumed a most singular form, one of which had belonged to an Indian of Cuzco, the other to a native of the Chincha tribe, who reside between Pisco and Canete. I was also shown on the same occasion a female skull in such excellent preservation, that one could still easily perceive the expression of the face. This was the skull of a half-breed Indian woman, named Maria Palacel, aged 25, who had died in the hospital of Santa Anna, 27th Sept. 1856, of dysentery, and on 1st March, 1859, nearly two and a half years later, had been disinterred in a state of complete preservation. Nature had in this case taken on herself the process of embalming, and had, owing to the dryness of the atmosphere, and the quant.i.ty of saline matter in the soil, secured results which in Europe could only have been obtained artificially and at a considerable expense.

Adjoining the Escuela de Medecina is the National Library, a large building containing some 30,000 volumes, treating of every department of human knowledge, but which, owing to want of means, has of late years received hardly any accession. The librarian is Don Francisco de Paula Vigil, a highly intelligent and liberal-minded priest and man of the world, who had been excommunicated by Pio Nono on account of his learned work, "Defence of the Principles of Secular Authority against the Pretensions of the Holy See." Nothing daunted by the fulmination of this penalty, the excellent old gentleman is prosecuting his researches yet farther, and is energetically defending his principles; and what is still more surprising, he has anything but fallen off in public estimation in consequence. This is due to the fact that, unlike the female population, the Peruvians are very tolerant in religious matters, and rather averse from those pre-disposed to spiritual matters, whence there results the very small influence of the Peruvian clergy, everywhere visible, and the obstinate virulent enmity with which also, since the Spanish yoke was cast off, the priestly party oppose the progress of liberal ideas. This feeling is moreover powerfully aided by the ghastly testimony of history, that it was the monks who first introduced the rack and the Inquisition into the country.

Father Vigil received me with much cordiality, and we had a long talk upon a variety of subjects. At last it turned upon his own well-known work, and the painful position in which he felt himself with respect to the See of Rome. This was the most interesting portion of our conversation. "It is not Catholicism that has made the majority of Catholic nations lag so woefully in the career of progress," exclaimed the venerable priest, "but that which Catholicism has suffered to be mixed up with it,--the Inquisition and Monasticism. It is marriage and labour that make individuals moral and useful, and nations great and powerful. Human society can get on very well without monks or nuns, but not without morals, not without matrimony and labour."

Had I not transcribed these words almost at the moment they were spoken, I should hardly have dared to repeat them here, for I durst not have trusted to my memory, that a Spanish American priest, should have made such a remark in the "city of the Three Kings." These revelations, which are far from being solitary, but find a responsive echo in the bosoms of a portion at least of the male population of the capital, are highly important in arriving at a conclusion respecting the actual religious sentiment of the Peruvian Republic, and are very marked indications that an immense movement is likewise preparing in the Catholic Church on the further side of the Andes; and that Peru also has found its "Father Pa.s.saglia." Nay, it would not surprise me in the least, should South America, which for upwards of three centuries has been dumbly obeying the behests of spiritual intolerance, suddenly emit letters and propositions which would amount to a virtual separation from the Roman Catholic Church!

It is but a few years since Catholic priests in the Legislative a.s.semblies of Nicaragua and Honduras recorded their votes in favour of repealing the ordinance of celibacy, and from their pulpits harangued their flocks on the advantages of revolutionary insurrection!

In a wing of the Library buildings is the National Museum, which, however, merely fills two moderate-sized apartments. The Natural History collection is in such a wretched neglected state that it is in imminent danger, the ornithological department especially, of being entirely eaten up by insects.

Amongst the most valuable are some Peruvian antiquities, such as weapons, mummies, and what are called _Huacos_, earthen jars, pots, and other utensils from ancient Indian graves. To the historical student the portraits of the whole of the Viceroys and Governors of Peru, which are suspended on the walls of the first apartment in chronological order, will prove extremely interesting. The finest head of the series, the one which most clearly tells of manly vigour, acuteness, and energy, is that of Francisco Pizarro, the natural son of a Spanish n.o.bleman, who tended swine in his boyhood, and ended his life as Viceroy of Peru, having been slain by an a.s.sa.s.sin in the 64th year of his age.

Of the educational inst.i.tutions, the only one deserving special remark is the "Escuela Normal Central" (Central Normal School), established by Government, at an expense of 160,000 dollars (33,600), and opened in 1859. Its object is to provide suitable school instruction for industrious children of poor or aged parents; but hitherto the prefects of the provinces have, by protection, presented almost exclusively children of persons of means and position, and sent them on to the capital. Owing to the great want of good schools. .h.i.therto, it happens that every one crowds towards this new inst.i.tute, which seems to promise to its pupils a more complete education and better training than any other. The number for which it was destined was 40 boarders and 200 day-scholars, the former of whom are well taken care of.

The system of education pursued is the Lancasterian, and is carried out by five professors. The estimated annual expenditure is about 20,000 dollars.

One of the directors, Mr. J. C. Braun, a German by birth, who not long before had come to Lima to settle, and taught Natural Philosophy and Chemistry, accompanied me throughout the extensive building, and specially pointed out a cla.s.s-room comfortably and even elegantly fitted up, as also a small museum of Natural History, with an excellent geological collection, and a small library attached to it. Singularly enough, the latter comprises a great number of school-books in much request among Protestant pedagogues. Apparently an order had been sent, without specifying any particular writers, to purchase good school-books at some German publis.h.i.+ng-house, and now the Catholic youth of bigoted Lima is taught from the works of Protestant teachers! Various surveys and maps covered the walls of this cla.s.s-room, all bearing evidence of their German origin in the names of publishers and places, most of them having been sent out from the distinguished house of Justus Perthes in Gotha.

One very remarkable and characteristic incident occurred at the opening of the school, at which were present the President of the Republic, Don Ramon de Castella, so hated and dreaded for his despotism, together with several senators and deputies. The Rector, Don Miguel Estorch, laid considerable stress, in the course of his address, upon the importance of really effective schools in a State, and maintained that, when children are well brought up, there is no longer any need of so large sums being spent for police and standing army to keep up security and order in the country.

This remark, which made a deep impression on all present, nevertheless gave much offence to the President, who rose and replied, in a tone of considerable asperity, that the Rector's view was erroneous, and that a proper military force was as indispensable as a good system of education; that it least of all became the Rector to touch upon such a topic in that place and such presence.

Under the present political _regime_, it is out of the question to look for anything like intellectual vigour in Lima, so spa.r.s.e are the elements of such. There is an utter absence of that sympathy, interest, and support which is necessary to its existence, alike on the part of Government and of society at large.[136] Works, such as Manuel Fuentes' valuable "Estadistica General de Lima" (General Statistics of Lima), can only be considered as solitary special performances. Also in the field of Journalism there is no person of mark visible, and even the few journals which appear in Lima, such as the _Comercio_ and the _Independiente_, have a very limited circulation. As only a small proportion of the population can read or interest itself in politics, the principles advocated in those journals exercise no influence, so that Government has less difficulty in acting up to them than would otherwise be the case.

One thing that particularly struck me was the hostility displayed to Austria, which, during my stay in Lima, manifested itself in the daily press and a fraction of the population. The politics of Austria were discussed with a bitterness of hate, which was the more surprising in a nation which is itself a prey to intestine disorders, and suffers itself to be led about a willing captive, in the fetters of a half-Indian despot.

I found, however, the clue to this excited language, when I learned on one occasion, that there are upwards of 8000 Piedmontese in Lima and Callao alone, chiefly shop-keepers and s.h.i.+pping-owners, who exercise a certain influence upon the native population. The war in Europe had so raised anew the pride of country in each Italian, and filled him with such sanguine patriotic aspirations and hopes of a united Italy, that his heated fancy beheld in every incident of the war the most righteous struggle that ever was engaged in, and in the opposite party the most detestable and inhuman of opponents.

Among such an auditory as those in which such opinions were ventilated, there was no difficulty in finding adherents. The ignorance of the native population respecting all countries on the other side of the Andes became conspicuously evident in the course of the discussion. Of Italy and her plains they had at least heard tell, since Peru maintains a pretty active trade with Genoa. If I am not mistaken, the great revolutionary leader and popular idol of Italy was once captain of a s.h.i.+p along the Peruvian coast, and left here many a friend and well-wisher to his cause and himself. Of Austria, on the other hand, there were simply dim rumours flitting about as of some shadowy land, or the vanished empire of the Incas. Singular to say, it was precisely the renowned Concordat made with the Papacy which had brought such discredit on Austrian policy among the Roman Catholic population. I dare not repeat here the strong language which was used, not alone in the journals but to myself personally, by educated Peruvians and foreigners settled here.

In fact, all the misery that Peru has suffered since its subjugation by the Spaniards, and its present drooping condition, is here universally ascribed to the overwhelming influence of Spanish monks and priests in secular affairs. It has not yet been forgotten that monks stood at the head of the Inquisition,--that for centuries the people groaned under their oppressive sway. Conscious of their own fate, and the condition to which the clerical weapons reduced the puerile half-civilized races which inhabit Mexico and Central America, the lively imagination of the Peruvians led to consequences resulting from such a state-policy far more disastrous than could possibly be the case among a free-souled people like the Austrians. For it is the chief merit of European civilization, that every political measure threatening to impede the march of ideas by any process of fettering men's minds, only serves to evoke a more restless activity, as in our actual state of human culture enlightenment and science form far too formidable a bulwark for reaction to obtain any permanent success, or even to succeed in overleaping.

Among the excursions which I made during my stay in Peru, there were two of special interest,--a ride to the ruins of Cajamarquilla, and a visit to the Temple of the Sun at Pachacamac, the erection of which dates from a period antecedent to the dynasty of the Incas.

The ruins of Cajamarquilla are about nine English miles distant from the capital. Owing to the insecurity of life and property even in the region immediately around the capital, these ruins are but rarely visited. But very few strangers settled in Lima knew these ruins, and it required a long time ere I could procure the slightest information respecting them.

My excellent host, Mr. Braun, who very soon perceived how much my heart was set on visiting these ancient Indian ruins, exerted himself to make up a party for me. It was a piece of real friendliness undertaken with the very kindest intentions, but unfortunately scientific objects do not usually admit of being mixed up with pleasure-parties, it being very difficult to unite the two. About twenty hors.e.m.e.n, chiefly English, had a.s.sembled to make the excursion. Among our company there were also a few ladies, whom the difficulties and dangers could not deter from joining us. As we had to take with us provisions for the entire party, a string of mules heavily laden with prog had been sent off early in the morning to the goal of our excursion. These preparations seemed to be by far the most important in the eyes of a majority of the cavalcade, after their arrival at the ruins themselves, an examination of which was evidently the last thing they had thought of when they bestrode their steeds in the morning.

The road to the ruins of Cajamarquilla is excessively fatiguing, rough, and rocky: nothing but climbing over rocky hills, upon which close to the very edge of the precipice is a faint Indian track, or crossing torrents, where the horse sinks to his crupper in the water, so that only a practised horseman can save himself from a thorough soaking.

Immediately on leaving the city begins a tract of desolate sterile stone-fields, in the midst of which one reaches what is known as the Hacienda de Pedrero, a lonely farm, where, it being as usual a fete-day of some Peruvian saint, a dozen field labourers had collected under the shadow of the verandah round the farm-house, blissfully occupied in doing nothing. No two of these were of the same breed; there were men of every variety of race and shade of colour; whites, Indians, Chinese, Negroes, Mulattoes, Mestizoes, Chinos, Sambos, Quadroons, &c. &c., and this specimen in little of the population of Peru would lead any observer to conjecture correctly as to the main reason of the low position held by the country in the scale of nations. As in the Hacienda of San Pedrero, so throughout the country one encounters fifty coloured men of all shades for one full-blooded white. In Chile, on the other hand, one has to penetrate deep into the interior before one finds any traces of the Indian stock, while of negro population, (and this is the greatest advantage enjoyed by that Republic over Peru,) there is absolutely none. In the settled parts along the coast of Chile there are none but whites, and even the working cla.s.ses are Spaniards, English, German, Italians, and North Americans. The preponderating white element in the population, their greater intelligence, energy, and perseverance, form the princ.i.p.al source of that intellectual and political activity which has placed Chile far in advance of the other Southern and Central-American Republics, and is opening a brilliant future to that State, far surpa.s.sing that of any of the neighbouring republics.

From the Hacienda de San Pedrero it is half an hour's ride to that of Guachipa and the Neveria of Don Pablo Sa.s.sio, where we engaged a guide, who accompanied us a couple of miles further to the goal of our excursion.

Cajamarquilla is an ancient Peruvian hamlet in the valley of and close to the river Rimac, which waters the whole district and makes it productive.

The remains of the dwellings are built exclusively of sun-dried bricks, and the laying out of each single apartment differs little from the mode of constructing Indian huts at the present day. It must to all appearance have been an extensive place once, as the ruins cover eight to ten acres.

Considering the little s.p.a.ce which the Indian of the present day requires for his household G.o.ds, it may be a.s.sumed that this was a place of from 30,000 to 40,000 inhabitants. I saw no buildings of very remarkable dimensions, nor indeed any one the laying out of which designated it as once intended for religious purposes. The ruins are for the most part, relics of simple mud-huts, all similarly laid out in single chambers, differing from each other mainly in the greater or less dimensions of the apartments. Nothing here told of the existence of any buildings intended for public meetings, temples for wors.h.i.+p, sacrificial altars, &c., such as one meets with in the ruined cities of Central America, in Copan, Quirigua, Peten, Palenque, and so forth. One perceives that each of these huts, like those inhabited by the Indians at the present day, consisted of two compartments, the entire superficial area being from 36 to 42 feet square. The larger of the two apartments is about 60 feet, the smaller from 12 to 18 feet in width and depth. Nowhere could we discern a trace of that special construction which is observable among the Indian races of the high lands of Guatemala, and is there usually employed for taking vapour-baths (Temaskal.)

To form any notion of the antiquity of these buildings is doubly difficult in a climate where it never rains and the temperature is the same throughout the year, and where consequently buildings are not exposed to the destructive alternations of cold, damp, and scorching heat, as in other less favoured countries. Even earthquakes are here not so much to be dreaded as where houses are of brick or stone, since the Adoba possesses far more elasticity than intractable building material, and is therefore better able to withstand the repeated undulations of the earth's surface.

The site of the town, which lies in a long deep valley surrounded on all sides by hills of the most fantastic shape, rising to a height of from 8000 to 10,000 feet, is exceedingly grand. Unfortunately when we visited it, all the peaks and hills of the country around were naked, barren, and bleak-looking. But in winter after the first dews have fallen, those slopes and table-lands that now looked so desolate are covered with dense deep-green verdure, when they make a far more agreeable impression on the beholder.

Of trees I saw only a few kinds of bamboo and acacia, which, more spreading than lofty, were visible in the swampy ground along the edges of the torrents. Some of the hills around seem at first sight like artificial fortifications, but when we approach closer there is not the slightest indication of Cajamarquilla having ever been a fort or place of defence.

To all appearance the spot, at the time of the Spaniards first coming to Peru, was inhabited by the Quichua Indians, who afterwards either abandoned voluntarily their peaceful abodes through dread of their pursuers, or were driven thence by violence. None of the present inhabitants of the vicinity, to whom I spoke, could give us any definite information as to the ancient history of the ruins, and one h.o.a.ry Indian, named Pablo Plata, who lives in the village of Guachipa, and remembers some wild traditions respecting Cajamarquilla, which he received by word of mouth from preceding generations, I unfortunately missed seeing owing to the shortness of my stay.

Quite close to the remains of the town, is at present a large Hacienda, with magnificent clover pasturages, fertilized by the river Rimac. It was at one of these green oases that our company sat down to a comfortable pic-nic, which spoke volumes for the preparations that had been made for creature comforts. No small portion of what had been brought with us was left on the field, to be gobbled up by the clouds of negroes that crowded round, glad of the opportunity of tasting something cooked in the European fas.h.i.+on, though they do not like them as well as the product of their own wretched native kettles. Thus, for example, our guide, a negro, preferred vegetables and _dulce_ (sweets) to meat, and declared sherry and cognac offered him to be "too strong."