Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

Dr Weddell makes numerous interesting zoological observations during his journey up the country. Whilst traversing the frozen puña, he was greatly surprised to find a ruin—in which his party slept, with snow for a counterpane—infested with mice, whose sole nourishment, in that barren and inhospitable district, must have been grass. The next halt was at the farm of Chulunguiani, the highest point upon the road from Tacna to La Paz. Here the party slept under a roof, and found a _pulperia_ or little shop, where they were able to obtain sardines in oil, sheep’s-milk cheese, and bad Bordeaux wine. A day was passed here in duck-shooting, and in hunting the _viscacha_, a small animal of the chinchilla tribe, having a dark grey fur, very soft, but less esteemed by furriers than that of the chinchilla. It is about the size of a rabbit, burrows amongst rocks, and is found only at a very great elevation, equal to that habitually preferred by the vicuña. Dr Weddell and his host shot two specimens. When the doctor went indoors to skin them, he found that the animals had lost the tips of their tails. The farm-steward, who had carried them in, explained that he had thus docked them to preserve them from decomposition, the extremity of the tail having the singular property of producing the corruption of the whole animal, if not cut off almost immediately after death. Dr Weddell was not very well satisfied with this explanation, but, to his astonishment, he afterwards found it everywhere the custom to sever the end of the viscacha’s tail.

Whilst at the farm (it was a sheep-farm—oxen live but do not thrive at that altitude) Dr Weddell did his utmost to get an alpaca, knowing that there were some in the neighbourhood. He was unsuccessful; and as to buying one, it is a most difficult matter in that country, where the Indians have an extraordinary dislike to parting with their domesticated animals, except sheep. During his stay in Bolivia, he repeatedly offered five or six times its value for an alpaca, and was refused. The alpaca wool, which constitutes one of the most important branches of Peruvian commerce, and is consumed chiefly in England, varies greatly in price, the pure white selling for thirty or thirty-five dollars a hundredweight; other colours at an average of twenty-two dollars. The weight of the fleeces ranges from three to seven pounds. “I have seen some of these animals,” says Dr Weddell, “whose virgin fleece almost swept the earth; when they attain that state, their faces are hidden in the wool that surrounds them.” From a priest, who afforded hospitality to the travellers at their second halt after they quitted the farm, they obtained some instructive details concerning the country, and a most marvellous story of a natural phenomenon observed by him during his rambles in the province of Yungas. “This was nothing less than a bird-plant—that is to say, a bird which, having alighted upon the ground, had there taken root. More than a hundred persons, the _cura_ said, had seen this wonder, and verified its reality. The person who had discovered the bird, unfortunately forgot one day to take it food, and it died. We were not informed how it had lived before it found a master.” It is odd to be able to trace a coincidence between the wild tale of the Peruvian puña and a tradition of Asiatic-Russian steppes. Edward Jerrmann, in his _Pictures from St Petersburg_,[11] tells of the _baranken_ or sheep-plant, supposed to produce the fine silky fleece that was in reality obtained by ripping unborn lambs from the mother’s belly.

At La Paz, which the little caravan reached after much fatigue, some severe hardship, and a few misadventures, but without serious disaster, one of the first things the travellers did was to avail of a letter of introduction from the Bolivian minister at Paris, to obtain an audience of the president of the republic, General Belzu, who had just recovered from wounds inflicted by assassins. One ball had struck him full in the face, and his visitors looked curiously for the trace. A scarcely perceptible scar, at the angle of the nose, was all they could discern. The bullet remained in the head, but occasioned no inconvenience; and the general said that his health was even better than before the occurrence. Some time afterwards he consulted Dr Weddell about his wounds, and the doctor learned, from the best source, the particulars of the attempt upon his life, which he briefly recapitulates.

“Raised to the presidency after the battle of Yamparaës, in which he discomfited the adherents of Velasco, General Belzu had not only to struggle against the remains of that party, but to defend himself against the secret and much more formidable attacks of General Ballivian, Velasco’s predecessor. It is said to have been at the instigation of Ballivian that the plot I have spoken of was formed; and, in support of this assertion, the remarkable fact is adduced that, upon the very day on which the crime was committed at Chuquisaca, Ballivian and one of his intimates quitted Copiapo (in Chili), where they were staying, and rode in great haste towards the frontiers of Bolivia.

“The day selected for the crime was the 6th September 1850. In the afternoon the president left his palace, accompanied by an aide-de-camp, and by Colonel Laguna, one of the principal members of the senate, and betook himself to the public walk. Scarcely had he reached it, when four men assailed him. He stood upon his defence, but at that moment a bullet struck him in the face, and he fell to the ground. The shot had been fired so near that his beard was burnt, and his cheeks were speckled with grains of powder. A second shot was fired, but without effect. When the assassins saw him stretched upon the earth, they fired three other shots at him, but, strange to relate, each time the weapons flashed in the pan. The chief of the brigands—a mulatto named Moralès, who was mounted—then tried to trample him under his horse’s feet, but without success. After several efforts, he at last urged his horse close up to his victim, and, leaning over him, put a pistol to his head and fired a last shot. ‘The tyrant is dead!’ he cried, and, spurring his horse, he galloped through the streets to the barracks, to excite the garrison to revolt. Meanwhile Laguna, the senator, stood by with folded arms, and when the crime seemed fully consummated, he walked away with its perpetrators, thus affording good grounds for suspicion of his complicity. He was shot a few days afterwards.

“As to the president, whose existence, with two bullets in his head, seemed almost impossible, he had not even, he himself assured me, lost consciousness for a moment; and when Moralès and his band left him, he got up unaided, and reached, bathed in his blood, a neighbouring hut, inhabited by a poor Indian. The news quickly spread that the chief of the state still lived, and the projected revolution was stifled in its birth.”

The preservation of the president’s life was little short of a miracle. One of the bullets had glanced off the skull without doing material damage beyond occasioning complete loss of hearing with the left ear; but the other had gone so deep into the head that it could not be extracted. Dr Weddell probed the wound, and satisfied himself of the course and position of the ball. A few hairs’-breadths farther, or a copper bullet instead of a leaden one, and all was over with General Belzu.

The travellers made some stay at La Paz, where they soon became acquainted with the principal people in the place. They passed their time in paying visits, in seeking useful information relative to the objects of their expedition, and in getting dreadfully out of breath by the ascent of steep streets in an atmosphere so rarified that a newly-arrived European can hardly take ten steps without a pause. English housewives will read with interest Dr Weddell’s account of Bolivian edibles, with disgust his sketch of the filthy horrors of a Bolivian kitchen, with wonderment and incredulity the recipes he gives for the manufacture of certain Bolivian dishes and delicacies. The mode of using potatoes is very original. As it freezes nearly every night of the year in the upper regions of the Andes, and the people have no means of preserving potatoes from frost, they anticipate its action, in order to regulate it. “They spread the potatoes on a thin layer of straw in the open air; they water them slightly, and expose them to the frost for three successive nights. When the vegetables subsequently thaw in the sun, they acquire a spongy consistency; in that state they are trodden under naked feet, in order to get rid of the skin and squeeze out the juice; then they are left in the air until perfectly dry.” This delectable preparation is known as the black _chuño_; and when wanted for food, requires soaking in water for six or eight days. White _chuño_ is prepared in another way, but one description of the sort will probably satisfy everybody of the untempting nature of the diet. Besides the animal and vegetable kingdoms, the mineral reign contributes to the gratification of South American epicures. An important section of the market at La Paz is occupied by sellers of a species of light-grey clay, very greasy to the touch, and called _pahsa_. The Indians alone consume it, mixing it with water to the consistency of thin gruel, and eating it with salt. At Chuquisaca, Dr Weddell was informed, a sort of earth called _chaco_, similar to the _pahsa_ of La Paz, was sold and eaten in little cups, like custard or chocolate; and he heard of a _señorita_ who thus ate dirt till she killed herself. The moderate use of this queer article of food is not injurious, but neither does it afford the slightest nourishment.

The beefsteak was long in making its appearance one day at Don Adolfo’s _gargotte_, where Dr Weddell and his companions usually took their meals, and an impatient Frenchman started from his seat to visit the kitchen and inquire into the delay. “Do not so!” cried a more experienced customer; “if you see how it is done, you will not eat for a week.” Dr Weddell had opportunity of inspecting more than one _Pazeña_ kitchen. Besides the cooks—which we take to be something indescribably abominable, since he describes them merely as a degree or two more disgusting than the scene of their operations—those kitchens contain three things,—shapeless earthen pots, black and greasy; heaps of dried lama-dung, used as fuel; guinea-pigs _ad libitum_. Guinea-pigs are the rabbits of Bolivia, where European rabbits are curiosities, called Castilian conies, and kept in cages like some outlandish monkey. The guinea-pig has the run of the kitchen, where he thrives and fattens, and is ultimately slaughtered and cooked.

Dr Weddell went to a ball, given in celebration of the birthday of a young and amiable Peruvian lady, recently allied with one of the best families of La Paz. His account of it gives a curious notion of the degree of civilisation of the best Bolivian society. No illuminated portals, liveried lackeys, or crowd of carriages indicated to the doctor (who had not yet been at the house) the scene of the festival, when he issued forth, at eight in the evening, white-waistcoated, and draped in his cloak. The street was dark and deserted. By inquiring at shops, he at last found the door he sought; it stood open. A little Indian girl, whom he encountered in the court, pointed to the staircase, up which he groped his way. At the end of a passage, upon the first floor, he discovered a faint light. Following this beacon, and passing through two doors that stood ajar, he reached a small room, where several of the guests were smoking cigars round a table, on which stood half-emptied cups and glasses. In a corner two _señoras_ were squatted, making ice; and a little farther off an old negress was putting sugar into a caldron of punch. The ice-makers were the mother and sister of the heroine of the day; the master of the house was amongst the smokers. Dr Weddell paid his respects, got rid of his cloak, and passed on into antechamber No. 2. This was in darkness, save for the glimmering rays of light that shot in from the adjacent rooms; and the doctor, seeing nothing, and advancing quickly, ran up against a soft substance, which he presently made out to be another _señora_, enveloped, even to the crown of her head, in a vast shawl. The room was half full of shawled ladies, seated on either side of the passage left open for the guests, some on chairs, others on trunks, and two or three upon a bed. These _señoras_, the doctor learned, were mothers, friends, or relatives of the guests. Not being sufficiently smart to show themselves in the foreground of the festival, they yet would have a view of it. They came as _mosqueteras_. Antechamber No. 2 contained what is called, in that country, the _mosqueteria_.[12] Another step took the doctor into the ball-room. Thence shawls and cigars were banished, and replaced by silks and lace, white gloves and black patent leather. Dr Weddell looked down with some shame at his boots, which he had himself blacked before leaving home. Silence reigned in the saloon. The ladies were on one side, the men upon the other, waiting for the military band, which was behind time. The first tap of the drum electrified the mute assemblage. Smiles and animation beamed upon every face. At the same time were distributed the fragrant contents of the caldron which the black Hecate had brewed in anteroom No. 1. Cups of punch circulated, and were not disdained by the ladies. Dancing began. The doctor, who, whilst climbing mountains, three days previously, in quest of flowers and simples, had suffered terribly from the _soroche_, and had counted a hundred and sixty throbs of his pulse in a minute, was feverish and ill at ease, and did not intend to dance. But he was borne away by the torrent. After the quadrille came another distribution of punch, and a proportionate rise in the ladies’ spirits; then came the ices which mamma and sister had so industriously manufactured, and which were, of course, pronounced excellent; then (Bolivia seems a very thirsty country) bottles of champagne and sherry made their appearance, every gentleman seized as many glasses as he could carry, and challenged the _señoritas_, who were not allowed to refuse. The fun now grew fast and furious. A new phase of the ball commenced. For formal quadrilles were substituted national dances. These, Dr Weddell acutely remarks, have little merit unless danced as soup is eaten—hot. The military orchestra played the airs of the _bailesitos_ with infinite spirit, one of the musicians accompanying them with words, in which there was some license and much wit. The _zapateado_ was danced amidst vehement applause. The good-humour of the evening was at its height. Farther they could not go, thought Dr Weddell. He was mistaken. In an interval of the dancing, it was decided that a colonel there present, who, in the doctor’s opinion, was abundantly gay, was not sufficiently so, and he was condemned to be shot. The sentence was forthwith carried into execution. The victim was placed upon a chair in the middle of the room, the band played a funeral march, and the unhappy (or happy) colonel was compelled to swallow, one after the other, as many glasses of champagne or sherry as there were young ladies present. This done, the dead-march ceased, and the culprit was released. The German students have a custom somewhat similar to this, _Der Fürst der Thoren_, when one sits astride upon a barrel, and imbibes all the beer, _schnaps_, and Rhenish presented to him by his boon-companions. But with the exception of Lola Montes, who smoked her cigar and drank her _chopine_ in a Heidelberg _studenten-kneipe_, the fair sex in Europe do not generally mingle in orgies of this kind. After a substantial supper, Dr Weddell was condemned to be shot, and shot accordingly. Other executions followed, and the jollity reached its climax by the men voting the execution _en masse_ of the whole of the ladies—a sentence which was resisted, but at last carried out. The Bolivian _señoritas_ must have strong heads, for we read that dancing recommenced and continued vigorously until five in the morning, when the band and the majority of the guests beat a retreat. A guitar was then procured, and the lady of the house and two or three of her friends, with half-a-dozen of the most active of the _caballeros_, danced on, and kept up the ball until one in the afternoon! After which, all we have to say is, Brava, Bolivia!

Dr Weddell, who had been unwell before the ball, was very ill after it, and lay in bed for six weeks. When his strength returned, he made an excursion to La Lancha, a point about four leagues from La Paz. The steps he and his companions had taken to obtain concessions of land on the Tipuani had not led to the results they anticipated; so they temporarily directed their attention to the river Chuquiaguillo, upon which La Lancha is situated. In the opinion of the natives, this place is _un pozo de oro_—a well of gold. Early one morning in May the three Frenchmen set out for it, upon mule-back, passing along a road enlivened, during its early portion, with various kinds of shrubs, bearing flowers of brilliant colours. At this part of the doctor’s book we come to a good deal of scientific detail, accompanied by woodcuts, all very interesting to miners and intending gold-seekers, but on which we shall not dwell. The gold of the Chuquiaguillo is found in the form of _pépites_, or nuggets, very various in shape and size. One of them, sent to Spain by the Conde de Moncloa, is said to have weighed more than twenty kilogrammes—forty-four English pounds. At various periods, and much more recently, nuggets of several pounds’ weight have been found.

“During the presidency of General Ballivian, an Indian came from time to time to La Paz, to sell pieces of gold, which had the appearance of being cut with a chisel from a considerable mass of the metal, and many persons judged, from the colour, that the mass in question must proceed from the river Chuquiaguillo. No bribe or promise could induce the Indian to reveal his secret. The affair got to the ears of the president, who expected to obtain without difficulty the information refused to others; but the Indian held out, and would say nothing. Finding gentle means ineffectual, the general tried threats, imprisonment, &c., but all in vain. Finally, the poor man was condemned to life-long service in the army, as guilty of disobedience and disrespect to the chief of the state! From that day forward nothing more was heard either of him or of his treasure. Some persons in La Paz told me that he perished under the lash.”

La Lancha (the word signifies a boat) is neither town nor village, but a marsh. On approaching it, up a ravine, the travellers came to an immense dike or barrier of rock, through one extremity of which the river had wrought itself a narrow passage. This dike had evidently long been an immense obstacle to the waters that flowed down the ravine of Chuquiaguillo, and it was a rational enough conclusion that, since those waters washed down gold, a good deal of the metal must still remain behind that natural barrier. But it seemed more probable that the river gathered its gold _after_ than _before_ passing the rocky wall. It struck Dr Weddell as pretty certain that Count Moncloa’s nugget would have remained behind the dike instead of being washed over it. The conclusion was reasonable enough. Behind the dike La Lancha begins, terminating a quarter of a league above it, at the foot of another rock, which rises vertically to a height of thirty feet. Over this rock the river dashes, covering its surface with great stalactites of ice, and then winds along the right side of the marsh, where it has made itself a channel.

“At one point of its surface the Lancha contracts, and thus presents the form of the figure 8. Perhaps one should seek the figure of a boat, to which the site has been compared, in the combination of the marsh and of the mountains of bluish schist that rise abruptly around it. According to this manner of viewing it, the surface of the marsh would represent the deck of the vessel, and the gold would be in the hold—that is to say, on the rock which is supposed to form the bottom of the basin. Several attempts have been made to ascertain the existence of the precious metal, and we were told a multitude of attractive tales—much too attractive to be credible. The upshot, however, which could not be concealed, was, that all attempts had ultimately failed, owing to the infiltration of water into the wells sunk in the attempt to reach the _veneros_ (strata of argillaceous sand) in which the gold is found.”

Nevertheless, the doctor thought the place worthy deliberate examination, and to that end established himself, with Mr Herrypon the engineer, and with Franck, their carpenter, under a tent, within which, during the night, the thermometer rarely stood at less than three degrees below zero. When the sun shone, the climate was genial and agreeable; but at three o’clock it dipped behind the mountains, which was the signal for the wanderers to creep under canvass, wrap themselves in blankets, and feast upon the hot stew their Indian cook had passed the morning in preparing. They had neighbours: several Indians had built huts on the ledges of the mountains, and daily drove their sheep and alpacas to graze upon the herbage of the marsh. From one of them Dr Weddell subsequently obtained an alpaca for his collection. Vicuñas occasionally strayed near the camp, and Franck managed to shoot one, which, with viscachas and a few wild ducks, improved the campaigning fare.

“Of the feathered inhabitants of the district, the most curious, unquestionably, is a species of variegated woodpecker (_Picus rupicola_), which, notwithstanding its name of _carpintero_ (carpenter), has all the habits of a mason. Instead of working at trees, as do its congeners, it finds nothing in that graminaceous region but rock and earth upon which to exercise its beak. These birds are invariably met with in isolated pairs; they skim the ground in flying, and settle, after a few moments’ flight, upon a sod or rock, uttering a long, shrill, cooing sound. If one is killed, it is rare that its mate does not come and place itself beside the dead body, as if imploring a similar fate—a request which the sportsman is not slow to comply with, for the _carpintero_ of the Cordilleras is a dainty morsel.”

Whilst Dr Weddell herborised, adding nearly a hundred species of plants to his collection, the engineer studied the Lancha with other views, and at last resolved to sound it. Mr Borniche, who had remained at La Paz, obtained authorisation from the Government—_el derecho de cateo_, or right of search, in the whole of the Lancha, during a fixed time, at the end of which he might, if he thought proper, purchase the ground at its rough value, fixed without reference to any mineral wealth it might contain. All this in accordance with the Mining Code. But poor Herrypon knew not what he undertook. He had no idea of mining difficulties in Bolivia. In this single operation he took the measure of the country’s capabilities. A month and a half passed in hammering out, in a forge at La Paz, a common and very clumsy Artesian screw, such as would have been got ready in three days in a European city, and at a cost considerably less than that of the coal consumed in the Bolivian smithy. The mere hire of the forge and bellows-blower was four dollars (sixteen shillings) a-day. When at last the instrument was ready and applied, layers of solid rock and a thick bed of diffluent clay long frustrated all the miners’ attempts. Finally, a deep well was sunk, but no gold was found, nor signs of any, and the miners quitted the place, where nothing less than the certainty of ultimately reaching a rich vein would have justified them in continuing their costly and laborious researches.

A second illness, by which he was attacked before he had fully recovered from the debilitating effects of the first, determined Dr Weddell to seek change of air. Whilst his engineering ally was still sinking wells and unprofitably probing the Lancha, he set out with Mr Borniche for Tipuani. Passing the magnificent Mount Illampŭ, which is upwards of seven thousand English yards high, and the great lake of Titicaca, they reached the town of Sorata, after an easy journey of thirty leagues. A toilsome one of forty remained to be accomplished before they should reach Tipuani. The roads were difficult, their muleteers fell ill, their mules were stubborn and restive, and _mal-pasos_ (dangerous places to pass) were numerous; but after a few small accidents and much fatigue they reached the village, which derives its name from _tipa_, the name of a tree that produces a gum known in that country as _sangre de drago_—dragon’s blood. This tree, it is said, was formerly very abundant in the valley of Tipuani. In the _aymara_, or Indian tongue, the particle _ni_, added to a word, implies possession. The village consists of fifty or sixty houses, built chiefly of palm trunks, placed side by side, thatched with leaves of the same tree, and partitioned, when partitions there are, with bamboos. “I found the place somewhat increased in size since my visit in 1847, but no way improved with respect to healthiness and cleanliness. At its entrance, stagnant water, covered with a green scum, filled old excavations, or _diggings_, and told that there, as in California, gold and fever are inseparable. It sufficed, moreover, to behold the pallid countenances of the inhabitants, to judge of the atmosphere we breathed.” This was hardly the place for an invalid to recruit his health and strength in, and, after visiting the mines, Dr Weddell set out for the Mission of Guanay, boating it down the rapid and rocky Tipuani—a rather dangerous mode of travelling. The priest of the Mission was an _aymara_ Indian, a native of La Paz; his parishioners were _Lecos_ Indians, considerable savages—although they had abjured paint, or only secretly used it—and very skilful with gun and bow, as well as in the capture of several large species of fish found in the river Mapiri, hard by which they dwelt. Some of these fish attain the weight of nearly a hundred pounds. They are taken with strong hooks, shot with arrows, or _hocussed_ and taken by hand. This last practice prevails amongst some other South American tribes.

“The substance employed for this purpose by the Guanay Indians is the milky juice of one of the largest trees of their forests, known by them under the name of Soliman. It is the _Hura crepitans_ of the botanist. To obtain this venomous milk, they cut numerous notches in the bark of the tree, and the sap which exudes runs down and soaks the earth at its foot. This earth, enclosed in a large sack, is thrown into the river, and as soon as the water becomes impregnated with it, the fish within the circle of its influence float inanimate upon the surface, and are collected without trouble. A creek or small branch of the river is usually selected for this operation. In other parts of Bolivia, and especially in the province of Yungas, they use, to poison the water, the green stalk of a small liana called _Pepko_ or _Sacha_, of which they crush, upon a stone, a fathom’s length or two, in that part of the river they wish to infect. Its effect is said to be as speedy as that of the Soliman sap, and I was assured that the fish thus taken could be eaten with impunity. It is not to be thence inferred that the sap, like the poison used for their arrows by the Indians of Guiana and on the Amazon, may be taken by man without injury; it is to the extreme smallness of the dose swallowed with the fish that its apparent harmlessness is to be attributed. The sap of the Soliman has, in fact, such caustic qualities, that its mere emanations cause violent irritation of the organs which receive them. We saw at the Mission a person who had lost his sight in consequence of a few drops of this juice having accidentally spirted into his eyes; and Messrs Boussingault and Rivero related that, having subjected the sap of the Soliman to evaporation, with a view to analyse it, the person who superintended the operation had his face swollen and his eyes and ears ulcerated, and was cured only after several days’ medical treatment.”

Bolivia is evidently a fine field for the botanist. Dr Weddell mentions a number of vegetables unknown, or little known, in Europe, but interesting and valuable by reason of their medical properties or economical uses. When in the province of Yungas, he briefly refers to two or three of the principal of these: “The _Matico_, a shrub of the pepper tribe, whose leaves, which resemble those of sage, have remarkable vulnerary properties; the _Vejuco_, a curious species of _Aristolochia_, whose crushed leaves are said to be an infallible cure for the bites of serpents; and a sort of _Myrica_, or wax-tree, whose berries, soaked in boiling water, yield in abundance a green wax, used to make candles.” Concerning the _Quinquina_, or Peruvian bark tree, and the _Coca_ shrub, whose leaves the Indians chew, the doctor gives many interesting particulars. When descending the river Coroico in a _balsa_ or Indian canoe, he frequently encountered his old acquaintances the _cascarilleros_, or bark-gatherers, who pursue their wild and solitary calling in the interior of the forests, dwelling under sheds of palm-leaves, and exposed to many dangers and hardships. Whilst seeking, one evening, a good place to bivouac, the doctor, and the _padre_ from the Guanay Mission, who was then his fellow-traveller, came upon a _cascarillero’s_ hut, in front of which they beheld a horrible spectacle. A man lay upon the ground in the agonies of death. He was almost naked; and, whilst yet alive, he was preyed upon by thousands of insects, whose stings and bites doubtless accelerated his end. “His face, especially, was so much swollen that its features could not be distinguished; and his limbs, the only portion of this corpse which still moved, were in an equally hideous state. Under the roof of leaves was the remainder of the poor wretch’s clothes, consisting of a straw hat and a ragged blanket; beside them lay a flint and steel, and an old knife. A small earthen pot contained the remains of his last meal—a little maize, and two or three frozen potatoes. For a few seconds the missionary contemplated this piteous object, then made a step towards the unfortunate man, and was about, I thought, to offer him some assistance, at least of a spiritual nature, but his courage failed him; and, suddenly turning away, he walked hastily to his _balsa_, and had himself rowed to a place some hundred yards farther, upon the opposite bank of the river.” In fact, the tortured bark-gatherer was beyond human aid, and on the brink of death. Dr Weddell covered him with his blanket, and returned to the boats.

We have dipped but into a few chapters of this compendious volume of nearly six hundred pages. A large portion of its contents are more interesting to naturalists and miners than to the general reader. Dr Weddell’s investigations are of a comprehensive nature, including the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, extending to an analysis of the various Indian languages of the country, and even to Bolivian music, of which he furnishes specimens. A map, some useful illustrations, an excellent table of contents, and headings to the chapters, give the work a completeness not so common in French as in English publications of this nature. Having adopted it for examination as a book of travel, and not of scientific and mining research, we recommend the numerous chapters we have not touched upon to those classes of readers to which they especially address themselves, and turn to Mr Pavie’s sketches of countries adjacent to those in which Dr Weddell has more recently wandered. It does not appear, from the former gentleman’s book, that his rambles had any more serious motive than love of locomotion, and a curiosity to view strange lands. The form he has adopted, and the modest pretensions announced in his preface, relieving him of most of the responsibility to which writers of travel usually hold themselves subject, he gives no account of himself, is very desultory, and does not take the trouble to supply dates. We collect, however, from his volume and preface, that some years have elapsed since his travels were performed, and that he was then a young man, eager for adventure, and enthusiastic for local peculiarities and national characteristics. It is with a view to variety, he tells us, that he has jumbled the sections of his book, and irregularly distributed those of them which have a natural order and sequence of their own. It was about twenty years ago—as we gather from the internal evidence of the chapters—that Mr Pavie left Buenos Ayres for Valparaiso, by the route across the Pampas. The moment was not particularly well chosen for such a journey. Anarchy was at its height in South America, and especially in the country of the Argentine republic. There was strife between federalists and unitarians. The Indians, resuming the offensive, had committed many depredations, and defeated the volunteers of the province of Cordova. The roads were far from safe; impediments and stoppages were numerous, and two months were consumed by the journey from La Plata to the Cordillera, a distance of three hundred leagues. When at only four days’ march from the Andes, snow fell, and a halt was called in the poor little town of Mendoza. The mountains were white from foot to summit; there was no possibility of crossing them; patience must be cultivated, and spring waited for. In these dull winter-quarters Mr Pavie had abundant leisure to note down the incidents of his two months’ journey, to gather characteristic traits of the people, and striking anecdotes of the war. We shall take him up, however, at an earlier period of his expedition, when he was but a week out from Buenos Ayres. He had traversed the province of the same name and that of Santa Fé, and hoped to reach the town of Cordova upon the following night. A forest succeeded to bare and monotonous plains. The horses trotted briskly over a light sandy soil, refreshed by numerous streams; the country was smiling, the vegetation rich. It still wanted two hours of sunset, and another league would bring the travellers to the post-house of the _esquina_—the Corner—situated at the junction of the two high-roads which connect the Pacific and the Atlantic—one leading northwards, to Bolivia and Peru, the other south-west, to Chili, passing through St Luis and Mendoza. Mr Pavie would have availed himself of the remaining daylight to push on a stage farther, but a young Cordovan, who accompanied him, and who was a lively and pleasant fellow, urged him to pass the night at the _esquina_. It was kept by a widow, he said, a certain Doña Ventura, whose eggs with tomata sauce were quite beyond praise, and whose daughter Pepa sang like a nightingale. It was a long road from that to Santiago de Chili—three hundred leagues, besides the Andes to cross, and the season was advanced, but Mr Pavie was unwilling to disoblige his friend.

“An old _gaucho_, the widow’s managing man, came out to receive us. Whilst the horses were unharnessed, a lad of twelve or thirteen, beautiful as one of Murillo’s shepherds—who was hurling stones at the wild pigeons perched upon the fig-trees—threw his sling across his shoulder, and ran into the house, crying out—‘Mother! mother! here is Don Mateo with some foreign señores.’ Don Mateo, our Cordovan friend, went to see after dinner, and to inform the post-mistress that we should not need horses before the next morning. The travellers’ room was tolerably clean, and very large. Its sole furniture consisted of a small lamp burning before an image of the Virgin, and of a guitar suspended from a nail. When dinner was ready, Doña Ventura brought in immense arm-chairs, covered with leather and gilt nails, and evidently made at Granada in the time of the Catholic kings. Some very brisk peasant girls (_cholas_), who said nothing, but looked a great deal, laid the table, and placed upon it the promised eggs and tomatas, and large salad-bowls containing lumps of roast meat swimming in gravy. Pimento had not been spared. The soup was brought to us, according to the custom of the country, at the end of the repast. The post-mistress, seated upon the estrade or platform that extended completely round the room, triumphed in our famous appetites, and proudly drew herself up whenever one of us paid her a more or less exaggerated compliment on the excellence of her dinner. Pepa, a handsome girl, with a remarkably white skin and fresh complexion, stood near her, smoking a cigarrito, and gazing about with her great blue eyes, which were shaded by long dark lashes. Juancito, the boy with the sling, rambled round the table, and unceremoniously tasted the Bordeaux wine in our glasses. Dinner cleared away, Mateo took down the guitar and presented it to Pepa: ‘Señorita,’ he said, ‘these gentlemen would be enchanted to hear you sing; favour them with a ballad, and they will consider you the most amiable girl—_la mas preciosa niña_—in the entire province.’ We were about to add our entreaties to those of Mateo, but the young girl had already tuned the instrument; and, without coughing, complaining of a cold, or waiting to be asked again, she sang half-a-dozen very long songs. At the end of every verse Mateo applauded. Pepa certainly had a charming voice, which she did not badly manage. Gradually her countenance grew animated. From time to time she stopped and exclaimed—‘Ay, Jesus! I am dead!’ and then went on again. Doña Ventura at last began to accompany her daughter’s song. At every chorus we slapped the table with the palms of our hands; and Mateo, imitating castanets with his fingers, danced like a madman in the middle of the hall.”

This thoroughly Spanish-American scene was interrupted by the arrival of fifteen waggons, each drawn by six oxen, and laden with dried fruits, cotton, and bales of horse-hair. They drew up in line upon the open space in whose centre stood the post-house. The oxen, unharnessed, joined the reserve drove which followed the convoy, in charge of a dozen horsemen; and from the innermost recesses of the vehicles there emerged bullock-drivers, women, children, passengers of all ages and of motley aspect, who had joined the caravan in order to get over three hundred leagues at small expense. Some ran to cut wood, others to fetch water. Fires were lighted, and enormous slices of meat set to roast before them upon spits stuck in the ground. Every convoy of this kind is under the orders of a _capataz_ or chief. This one was commanded by a certain Gil Perez, whose arrival seemed of strong interest to Doña Ventura and her daughter. Pepa hastened to adorn herself with a silk shawl, the gaudy product of a Lyons loom, and with a fashionable Buenos Ayres comb, a foot high. His camp established, Gil Perez entered the house with a beaming countenance. He had brought presents for everybody;—a scarf and satin shoes for Pepa, a Peruvian gold chain for her mother, a dirk for Juancito. In Spanish countries acquaintance is soon made. His gifts distributed, Perez sat down and chatted with Don Mateo and the other travellers; whilst the bullock-drivers, the _cholas_, and the postilions of the _esquina_, were dancing outside. By and by, Perez, who had been out to look after his people, announced the approach of more travellers, indicated by a cloud of dust in the south-east. Juancito went out to reconnoitre, and reported that the muleteers from San Juan were close at hand. Pepa and her mother exchanged a rapid glance. The muleteers halted at some distance from the posting-house, and unloaded their beasts, each of which carried two barrels of brandy. Their chief dismounted and walked towards the house, his saddle-bags over his shoulder. Walking rapidly and on tiptoe, on account of the long steel spurs which he dragged at his heels, he knocked at Doña Ventura’s door. Juancito answered.

“Gil Perez looked at the muleteer pretty much as an admiral might look at the humble master of a merchantman. The muleteer, disconcerted at finding the room full of strange faces, to say nothing of that of the _capataz_, which seemed greatly to incommode him, paused near the door for some seconds.

“‘Come in, Fernando,’ said Doña Ventura; ‘you are surprised to see my Pepita in full dress, eh, my lad? We have had an arrival of gentlemen. Will you sup? I have some _puchero_ at hand.’

“‘Thanks, señora,’ replied Fernando; ‘I want nothing. You know that I never pass this way without calling to see Pepita. I have brought you a little barrel of the best brandy that has been tasted at San Juan for many a year.’

“‘Is the brandy for Pepa?’ said Gil Perez.

“‘Don Gil,’ replied the muleteer, ‘every one gives what he has, and according to his means.’ Then, turning to the young girl—‘Pepita,’ he said, ‘when you were a child you liked the tarts made in our mountains; I have brought you some, and of the best peaches.’

“Whilst speaking, he drew from his saddle-bags the little barrel of brandy, and a dozen square cakes filled with a thick marmalade, which seemed particularly grateful to the gums of Juancito. Then he sat himself down near Pepa, and looked proudly at the captain of the waggons.

“‘How many beasts have you?’ said the latter.

“‘Fifteen, besides saddle-horses.’

“‘Just as many as I have carts. Not so bad, really. You carry thirty casks—half a load for one of my waggons. Pshaw! what can you earn? A poor trade is yours, my lad, and you will follow it long before you grow rich.’

“‘When I am tired of it,’ replied Fernando, ‘I will try another.’ The muleteer spoke these words in a singular tone.

“‘Fernando is stout-hearted,’ said Doña Ventura, ‘and he will do well yet; and he will find, somewhere in his own province, a pretty girl with a good dowry. Eh, Fernando?’

“Fernando made no reply, but pulled down his little pointed hat over his forehead;—his eyes glittered like those of a cat. Seizing the guitar, which lay upon the bench beside Pepa, he strummed it with an absent air, like one absorbed by his thoughts. Juancito, who stood before him, waiting doubtless for the end of the prelude, and for the commencement of some lively mountain ditty, pushed his arm, and said—‘Fernando, have you seen the fine presents Gil Perez has brought us?’ Without raising his eyes, the muleteer sang, in a low voice, this verse of an old ballad:—

‘No estès tan contenta, Juana,
En ver me penar por ti;
Que lo que hoy fuere de mi,
Podrá ser de ti mañana,’[13]

Then suddenly throwing down the guitar, he jumped upon the estrade, extinguished the lamp that burned before the Madonna, and clapped his hand to his knife. Pepa took refuge close to her mother. At the cry she uttered, Gil Perez stood upon his guard; but Fernando passed close by him without looking at him, and reached the door. ‘Ah, Pepita!’ muttered he as he went out, ‘you will drive me to harm!’ And he disappeared.”

This stormy episode broke up the party. Agitated and alarmed, Doña Ventura and her daughter betook themselves to their bedchambers. The travellers wrapped themselves in their blankets—Mr Pavie establishing himself, according to his custom, in their _coche-galera_, or travelling-carriage, where he slept but little, owing to the songs and dancing of the waggon-drivers, and the screaming of innumerable parrots. The night passed without incident, and at daybreak he was roused by Mateo. The horses were ready; the San Juan muleteers were already on their road; Gil Perez, foot in stirrup, was directing the departure of his convoy. That evening the travellers reached Cordova.

Several months had elapsed since the scene at the _esquina_, and Mr Pavie, after rambling through Chili and Pern, returned to Santiago, the capital of the former country. Looking on, one night, at a dance in a public garden, he fell in with his old acquaintance, Don Mateo, somewhat threadbare, but still a passionate lover of song and dance. One of the political changes so common in South America had driven him across the Andes. He was an exile, proscribed in his own country. His party had fallen, his patrimony had been swallowed up by fines, and he deemed himself fortunate to have saved his neck.

“Do you remember,” said Mateo, as he leaned beside his French friend upon the parapet bordering the Tajamar, and gazed at the summits of the Cordillera, which still reflected a last gleam of sun—“do you recollect one evening at the _esquina_? Well, of all the persons then assembled under Doña Ventura’s hospitable roof, and including her and her daughter, how many, do you suppose, still live? Two, you and I! The first scene of the drama passed before your eyes. I will narrate those that ensued. You have not forgotten our merry supper at the posting-house, Gil Perez and his waggons, and Fernando, the little muleteer with the long spurs?”

Mr Pavie perfectly remembered all that had passed at the _esquina_. Mateo took up the tale from the moment of their departure. Although Fernando and Gil Perez started nearly at the same moment, they met no more until they reached Buenos Ayres. The _aria_ (string of mules) trotted briskly over the plain, whilst the heavy waggons lingered in the ruts. Four days had elapsed since Fernando’s arrival, when Perez reached his usual halting-ground near the hill of the Retiro, and, after turning out his cattle to graze, rode into the city. As soon as he was gone, the bullock-drivers, a vagabond and insubordinate race, gathered round the camp-fires to discuss the news that had reached them of insurrections in the inland provinces. Most of these wild _gauchos_ felt sorely tempted to exchange goad for lance, and join the armed bands then scouring the country. To gallop in boundless plains, to pillage isolated farms, and attack hamlets—such was the fascinating perspective that offered itself to their imagination. Whilst they were debating the probable course of events in the _tierra adentro_, Fernando came by. He was on foot; his long spurs were still at his heels.

“‘Ha!’ cried the bullock-drivers, ‘here is the little muleteer, the brandy-merchant from San Juan! Give us a barrel, Fernando, and we will drink your health.’

“‘Give me something to eat,’ replied the muleteer, ‘I am fasting since yesterday.’

“And cutting a slice off a great piece of beef that roasted at the fire, he took one end of it in his fingers, put the other into his mouth, and swallowed it at a single gulp, as a lazzarone swallows an ell of macaroni. Then he wiped his knife on his cowskin boot and lay down under a cart to sleep. When Gil Perez returned and walked round his camp, he saw the muleteer, who was snoring on the grass.

“‘Hallo, Fernando!’ he cried, ‘what do you there, my man?’

“‘Resting myself,’ replied Fernando, rubbing his eyes, ‘I have passed four days and nights playing at cards.’

“‘Have you won?’

“‘Lost everything—my load of brandy, my mules, all I had in the world. Lend me twenty dollars, Gil Perez?’

“‘To gamble them?’

“‘Perhaps. See, I was a steady man; I never played, and you are cause that I am perhaps about to become a robber. I have known Pepa from her childhood; her mother received me well, saw that I loved her daughter, and encouraged me to work and increase my little trade. Every trip I made I never missed calling at the _esquina_, and every trip I found Pepa prettier than before. She received me joyfully, and I was happy. But since two years that you have gone that road, all is changed. With your gold chains and silk shawls you have turned their heads. Lend me twenty dollars, that I may make them presents and regain their favour. You are rich, Gil Perez—you will find a wife in the towns, at Salta, Cordova, where you please; I am poor, but I love Pepita, the only girl who would not refuse me, ruined though I be.’”

Surprised at the muleteer’s frank explanation and request, Gil Perez offered him the twenty dollars, but laughed at the idea of abandoning his pretensions to Pepita. Fernando refused the money, and departed with a muttered threat. That night he took to the plain, mounted on a fine horse and bearing gold in his girdle—the spoils of a traveller he had waylaid and murdered. The die was cast; the honest muleteer had become a _gaucho malo_.

A few days after this, Fernando rode up to the _esquina_. Little Juancito ran to kiss him. Torribio, the steward, surprised to see him come alone, riding a valuable horse and without his usual retinue of mules and muleteers, hurried out to meet him. “_Amigo!_” he cried, “whence come you, thus finely equipped? It seems the San Juan brandy fetches a good price in the market!” Without replying, Fernando abruptly opened the door and addressed the two women, astonished at his sudden appearance.

“The _gauchada_ is about to take the field,” he said, “and I greatly fear that one of its earliest visits will be for you. I have friends in its ranks; give me your daughter, Doña Ventura, and I answer for her safety and yours.’

“‘Since when are you allied with the brigands, Fernando?’ indignantly demanded Doña Ventura.

“‘Pepita,’ said the muleteer, evading reply, ‘will you have me?—You tremble—you turn away your head!—Are you afraid of me, Pepita? Do you take me for a bandit?’

“There was something terrible in the sound of Fernando’s voice, which even the passionate love he still felt for Pepa was insufficient to soften. The young girl in vain endeavoured to speak.

“‘Fernando,’ cried Doña Ventura, ‘when last you were here, you left my house like a madman, your hand on the haft of your knife; you enter it to-day like a bandit, with threats upon your lips. Begone, and return no more; I need not your protection.’

“‘Ha! you mean to say that Gil Perez will protect you. Reckon upon that! There are times when fine shawls and gold chains are not worth sabre and carbine. After all, I too have gold! See here. Once more, Pepita, will you follow me? I am no longer a muleteer; it was too base a trade, was it not? Shall I carry you off on my horse’s crupper into the sierra of Cordova and to Chili?’”

Pepa, frightened at the _gaucho’s_ fierce voice and vehement manner, burst into tears and fainted in her mother’s arms. Fernando hastily left the house, his love—the last good sentiment his heart retained—exchanged for bitter hate.

It was not long after this incident, early upon a winter’s morning, that Gil Perez, riding ahead of his waggons, which had camped on the banks of the Rio Salado, discerned at the horizon a dozen black specks that rapidly approached him. Soon he made them out to be horsemen, armed some with lances, others with rifles. Deeming them suspicious, he rode back and formed his caravan in order of battle. The waggons were arranged in a circle, the bullocks inwards; arms were distributed to the men, and from between the waggons the muzzles of pistols and blunderbusses menaced those who should assail the fortress. These arrangements were scarcely made when the party of horsemen slackened speed, and one of them rode forward alone. At twenty paces from the waggons he drew rein and removed the handkerchief, which partly concealed his face.

“‘Don Gil,’ cried the horseman, ‘confess that the little muleteer Fernando has given you a famous fright.’

“‘It is you,’ replied Perez, ‘what do you here? what do you want of us?’

“‘I have changed my trade, _amigo_; did I not once tell you that when I should be tired of mule-driving, I had another trade in view? I am now an ostrich hunter. A fine flock escaped from us this morning. Have you not met it?’