The country is exceedingly hot and unwholesome, and the inhabitants are particularly subject to certain malignant warts or carbuncles of a dangerous nature on the face and other parts of the body, having very deep roots, which are more dangerous than the small-pox, and almost equally destructive as the carbuncles of the plague. The natives have many temples, of which the doors always front the east, and are closed only by cotton curtains. In each temple there are two idols or figures in relief resembling black goats, before which they continually burn certain sweet-smelling woods. From this wood a certain liquor exudes, when the bark is stripped off, which has a strong and disagreeable flavour, by means of which dead bodies are preserved free from corruption. In their temples, they have also representations of large serpents, to which they give adoration; besides which every nation, district, tribe or house, had its particular god or idol. In some temples, particularly in those of certain villages which were called Pafao, the walls and pillars were hung round with dried bodies of men women and children, in the form of crosses, which were all so thoroughly embalmed by means of the liquor already mentioned, that they were entirely devoid of bad smell. In these places also they had many human heads hung up; which by means of certain drugs with which they were anointed, were so much shrunk or dried up as to be no bigger than a mans fist121.
This country is extremely dry, as it very seldom has any rain, and its rivulets are few and scanty; so that the people are reduced to the necessity of digging pit-wells, or of procuring water from certain pools or reservoirs. Their houses are built of large canes or reeds. It possesses gold, but of a very low quantity; and has very few fruits. The inhabitants use small canoes hollowed out of the trunks of trees, and a sort of rafts which are very flat. The whole coast abounds in fish, and whales are sometimes seen in these seas. On the doors of the temples in that district which is called Caraque, the figures of men are sometimes seen, which have dresses somewhat resembling those of our deacons.
Near the last mentioned province, at Cape St Helena in the province of Guayaquil, there are certain springs or mineral veins which give out a species of bitumen resembling pitch or tar, and which is applied to the same purposes. The Indians of that country pretend that in ancient times it was inhabited by giants, who were four times the height of ordinary men122. The Spaniards saw two representations of these giants at Puerto viejo, one of a man and the other of a woman, and the inhabitants related a traditionary tale of the descent of a young man from heaven, whose countenance and body shone like the sun, who fought against the giants and destroyed them with flames of fire. In the year 1543, Captain Juan de Holmos, lieutenant-governor of Puerto viejo, caused a certain valley to be carefully examined, in which these giants were were said to have been destroyed, and in which ribs and other bones of prodigious size were dug up, which fully confirmed the traditions of the Indians123. The natives of this country have no knowledge whatever of writing, nor had they even any use of that method of painting employed by the Mexicans for preserving the memory of ancient events, which were handed down from father to son merely by traditionary stories. In some places indeed they used an extraordinary means for preserving the remembrance of important events, by certain cords or strings of cotton called Quippos, on which they represented numbers by knots of different kinds, and at regulated intervals, from units up to dozens, and so forth; the cords being of the same colours with those things which they were intended to represent. In every province, there are persons who are entrusted with the care of these quippos, who are named Quippo camayos, who register public matters by means of these coloured strings and knots artificially disposed; and it is wonderful with what readiness these men understand and explain to others events that have happened several ages ago. There are public buildings throughout the country which are used as magazines of these quippos.
To the south of the equator, and near the coast, is the island of Puna124, about twelve leagues in circumference, containing abundance of game, and having great quantities of fish on its shores. It has plenty of fresh water, and was formerly very populous, its inhabitants being almost continually engaged in war, especially with the people of Tumbez, which is twelve leagues distant to the south. These people wore shirts, above which they had a kind of woollen garments. They went to sea in a peculiar kind of flats or rafts, made of long planks of a light wood fixed to two other cross planks below them to hold them together. The upper planks are always an uneven number, usually five, but sometimes seven or nine; that in the middle, on which the conductor of the float sits and rows, being longer than the others, which are shorter and shorter toward the sides, and they are covered by a species of awning to keep those who sit upon them from the weather. Some of these floats are large enough to carry fifty men and three horses, and are navigated both by oars and sails, in the use of which the Indians are very expert. Sometimes, when the Spaniards have trusted themselves on these floats, the Indian rowers have contrived to loosen the planks, leaving the christians to perish, and saving themselves by swimming. The Indians of that island were armed with bows and slings, and with maces and axes of silver and copper. They had likewise spears or lances, having heads made of gold very much alloyed; and both men and women wore rings and other ornaments of gold, and their most ordinary utensils were made of gold and silver. The lord of this island was much feared and respected by his subjects, and so extremely jealous of his women, that those who had the care of them were not only eunuchs, but had their noses cut off. In a small island near Puna, there was found in a house the representation of a garden, having the figures of various trees and plants artificially made of gold and silver.
Opposite to the island of Puna on the main land, there dwelt a nation or tribe which had given so much offence to the king of Peru, that they were obliged as a punishment to extirpate all their upper teeth; in consequence of which, even now, the people of that district have no teeth in their upper jaws. From Tumbez for five hundred leagues to the south along the coast of the south sea, and for ten leagues in breadth, more or less according to the distance between the sea and the mountains, it never rains or thunders. But on the mountains which bound that maritime plain, there are both rain and thunder, and the climate has the vicissitudes of summer and winter nearly as in Spain. While it is winter in the mountain, it is summer all along the coast; and on the contrary, during the summer on the mountain the coast has what may be termed winter. The length of Peru, from the city of St Juan de Parto to the province of Chili lately discovered, is above 1800125 leagues of Castille. Along the whole of that length, a vast chain of exceedingly high and desert mountains extends from north to south, in some places fifteen or twenty leagues distant from the sea, and less in others. The whole country is thus divided into two portions, all the space between the mountains and the sea being denominated the plain, and all beyond is called the mountain.
The whole plain of Peru is sandy and extremely arid, as it never has any rain, and there are no springs or wells, nor any rivulets, except in four or five places near the sea, where the water is brackish. The only water used by the inhabitants is from torrents which come down from the mountain, and which are there formed by rain and the melting of snow, as there are even very few springs in the mountainous part of the country. In some places, these torrents or mountain-streams are twelve fifteen or twenty leagues distance from each other, but generally only seven or eight leagues; and travellers for the most part are under the necessity of regulating their days journies by these streams or rivers, that they may have water for themselves and cattle. Along these rivers, for the breadth of a league, more or less according to the nature of the soil, there are some groves and fruit-trees, and maize fields cultivated by the Indians, to which wheat has been added since the establishment of the Spaniards. For the purpose of irrigating or watering these cultivated fields, small canals are dug from the rivers, to conduct the water wherever it is necessary and where that can be done; and in the construction of these the natives are exceedingly ingenious and careful, having often to draw these canals seven or eight leagues by various circuits to avoid intermediate hollows, although perhaps the whole breadth of the vale may not exceed half a league. In all these smaller vales along the streams and torrents, from the mountain to the sea, the country is exceedingly fertile and agreeable. Several of these torrents are so large and deep, such as those of Santa, Baranca, and others, that without the assistance of the Indians, who break and diminish for a short time the force of the current, by means of piles and branches forming a temporary wear or dike, the Spaniards would be unable to pass. In these hazardous passages, it was necessary to get over with all possible expedition, to avoid the violence of the stream, which often rolled down very large stones. Travellers in the plain of Peru, when going north or south, almost always keep within sight of the sea, where the torrents are less violent, owing to the greater flatness of the plain as it recedes from the mountain. Yet in winter the passage of these torrents is extremely dangerous, as they cannot be then forded, and must be crossed in barks or floats like those formerly mentioned, or on a kind of rafts made of gourds inclosed in a net, on which the passenger reclines, while one Indian swims before pulling the raft after him with a rope, and another Indian swims behind and pushes the raft before him.
121
This circumstance is unintelligible, as the bones could not shrink, unless by supposing these
122
A good deal more is said of these giants, both by Zarate and Garcilasso de la Vega, p. 363, but so vague and absurd as not to be worth insertion. The whole story seems to have arisen out of the colossal representation of a man and woman at Puerto viejo. –E.
123
This is merely a repetition of the
124
Puna is in the bay of Guayaquil, in lat. 3° S. and is near
125
The estimate in the text is exceedingly erroneous. The city of Parto is in lat. 1° 12' N. and the Rio de Loa, or commencement of the desert of Atacama, in lat. 21° 26' S. which give only a difference of nearly 25 degrees of latitude, which at 17-1/2 Spanish leagues to the degree are only 438 leagues. Even supposing the text to include Chili, which extends to 39° 21' S. the whole extent of Peru and Chili is only 753 Spanish leagues. –E.