OF THE QUITENIAN ANDES. 179 
and barley fields. A short ascent from it brought us upon the 
Paramo de Tiocajas, which is full six leagues across. Anything 
more desolate than this paramo I have nowhere seen. It is one 
great desert of moveable sand, in which the distant patches of 
Cacti, Hedyotis, and a succulent Composita, only render ita 
‘nakedness more apparent. Where there is a little moisture, soli- 
tary plants of a silky-leaved Plantago struggle for existence. The 
altitude is about the same as that of Sanancajas, and it may be 
imagined how cheerless was a slow ride of nearly twenty miles over 
such a waste, rendered all the more gloomy by a leaden sky over- 
head, and a piercing wind which came laden with mist and' fine 
sand. I was obliged to go nearly at the pace of my loaded beasts, 
the unsettled state of the country, and the number of deserters 
from the “ constitutional” army roaming about, rendering it unsafe 
to leave my goods a moment. Yet even such an “ Ager Syrtieus"' 
has its points of interest, for on this place is seen the dividing of the 
waters of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. We passed many small 
streams, some rising on the paramo, and some in the western Cordil- 
lera, but all running eastward to join the Great River, with whose 
waters and forests I was long so familiar; when, however, we 
approached the southern side of the paramo, we came on the Rio 
de Pumacháca (River of the Bridge of Tigers), a considerable 
stream rising in the eastern Cordillera and running westward 
towards the Pacific; it is in fact one of the sources of the river 
Yaguáchi, which enters the gulf of Guayaquil. From the Puma- 
cháca northward, until very near Quito, all the streams of the 
central plain between the two branches of the Cordillera flow east- 
ward, and unite in the gorge of Вайоз to form the river Pastusa, 
which speedily reaches the Amazonian plain, and thence the 
Atlantic ; but the streams around Quito itself unite to form the 
river of Esmeraldas, and seek the Pacific. Near the Pumacháca 
there was rather more vegetation; patches of Cyperacee were dotted 
with the white flowers of a minute Lobelia, which I have seen in 
many similar situations, and groups of Cactus were draped over 
by an Atropa, remarkable for its aromatic leaves. It is singular 
that in so deadly a genus all the species I have seen in the Qui- 
tenian Andes have edible though very acid fruit, and that the 
Shoots are cropped by asses and llamas. 
As we descended from the southern side of the paramo, the 
Hedyotis began to be mixed with a small labiate shrub: of very 
Similar foliage, and bearing numerous spikes of lilae or violet 
flowers ; and farther down the latter grew so abundantly that. it 
