212 Land Magnetic Observations, 1914-20 



Two days were spent in reoccupying Mr. Ault's 1912 station at Oroya, and in trying 

 to accustom ourselves to the altitude before continuing to Cerro de Pasco, where obser- 

 vations were made later. It had been planned to make other observations in this vicinity, 

 but as Mr. Jones had been violently ill from soroche or mountain sickness from the 

 day of our arrival at Oroya, it was deemed advisable to curtail our work and begin our 

 descent to a lower altitude as soon as possible. Accordingly, on May 22 we left Cerro 

 de Pasco on horse-back, with a 3-mule luggage caravan. In a remarkably short time 

 after beginning the descent, all signs of soroche disappeared, and we enjoyed the strange 

 sensation of riding in one day from an icebound mining town to a valley in which many 

 varieties of tropical fruits were then ripening. 



Guided by information which we had been accumulating along the way, we radically 

 modified our plan on reaching Huanuco, 2 days later, and decided to leave behind mag- 

 netometer No. 10, dip circle No. 202, and one observing tent, arranging to complete the 

 expedition in company. In accordance with this decision, intercomparisons of instru- 

 ments were carried out at Huanuco, and the above-named part of our equipment was 

 packed and sent back to Lima, there to be stored until our return. Final preparations 

 were made for our descent of the Huallaga River, and having procured mules, we set 

 out on June 4 for the 3-day trip to Vista Alegre, an hacienda which marked the end 

 of the mule trails. After making observations at Hacienda San Juan, all our luggage 

 was rearranged in convenient form for transportation by Indian carriers, who were 

 secured through the kind assistance of the hacendados of Vista Alegre and San Juan, 

 for the trip to a point from which it would be possible to navigate the Huallaga. Haci- 

 endas Vista Alegre and San Juan are both engaged in the cultivation and preparation of 

 coca, which is universally used by the Indians in the mountain regions of Peru. Every 

 man and woman carries a small woven or leather bag containing the dried coca leaves 

 and a little gourd bottle of unslaked lime. The addition of a little lime is necessary 

 to make the "chew" properly effective. We were invariably obliged to furnish coca to 

 secure men as carriers or as arrieros, the average man requiring from 4 to 8 "chews" 

 per day. Indeed, on one part of our trip we were much confused by encountering an 

 unfamiliar unit of distance, as all our inquiries concerning distances elicited replies only 

 in terms of "coquiadas." After a while we learned that a "coquiada" was the distance 

 which a carrier would normally cover between stops to chew coca. 



Tingo Maria, reached after 3 days on foot with a caravan of 6 Indians carrying our 

 luggage over trails that have been very fittingly described as "monkey roads," is a 

 settlement of about 8 families located at the junction of the Monson River with the 

 Huallaga, and is controlled by Seiior Mariana Rosales. At the time of our arrival and 

 for several days subsequent thereto, the community was celebrating the feast day of 

 its patron saint, and consequently was quite incapable of giving to us much attention, 

 information, or assistance. Hospitality was extended by Seiior Rosales, however, and 

 we were energetically and persistently invited to assist in the celebration by partaking 

 of their aguardiente and chicha, and by setting off rockets. 



Magnetic observations were made, and after the feast days we secured one man as 

 guide and a balsa or raft of 5 poles bound together with bark and just sufficiently buoyant 

 to float ourselves and our luggage. On June 15 we launched our strange craft on the 

 waters of the Huallaga, that mysterious stream of which we had been able to learn so 

 little even up to this point. Our guide sat upon the bow of the balsa in water to his 

 knees, steering with an enormous paddle past shoals and rocks, snags and whirlpools, 

 in a current so rapid that it gave but little time for recovering poise from one river 

 phase to the next. The splashing water in the rapids kept us continually soaked, and 

 often it was also necessary to get out in the stream and lower the raft by ropes over a 

 particularly shoal place or past a snag against which the current set too strongly. Neither 



