42 REMARKS ON THE PRACTICABILITY, &CC. 



continued state of drunkenness. The few people of caste, or pos- 

 sessors of Chacras, who are inclined or willing to advance in agri- 

 culture, are prevented by the bad customs which have been allowed 

 to prevail. It is with the greatest difficulty that labourers can be 

 procured^ as the people say they are now free and are not obliged 

 to work. The consequence is that, frequently, work is left undone, 

 or the season is in part passed before the ground is prepared, or the 

 crops sown. Even when labourers are procured they receive two 

 reals, their meat or food, and a bottle of aguardiente* daily ; which 

 for the few hours' work they perform, is an enormous imposition 

 and tax on the agriculturist. Bee's wax, in the rough state, is 

 always at a dollar the pound, tucuyas at two reals the vara, and 

 lonas at one real the vara : neither of which, after paying all ex- 

 pences of freight, &c. to Chachapoyas or Caxamarca, realises more 

 than half. Even the hats which are sold at three and four dollars 

 in Mayobamba, are sold for much less in Chachapoyas. 



The few who venture with sarsaparilla, tucuyas, hats, &c., to 

 Taba-tinga, fare but little better : though they get their own no- 

 minal value for their goods, it is in effects, and they are obliged to 

 take in return spirits, (gin) earthenware, iron, copper, and printed 

 goods, &c., of the most ordinary class, all mixed together, many of 

 which remain on their hands for years. The sarsaparilla the Bra- 

 zilian buys from them at six dollars the aroles of thirty-four pounds, 

 which he sells again at eighteen or twenty dollars in Para. 



The produce of Maynas cannot, at any period, be expected to pay 

 by the way of Chachapoyas and Caxamarca to the coast, from the 

 length and badness of the roads. It is only by the river Amazons, 

 and with the assistance of steam vessels ascending to Yuminaguas, 

 that this part can be expected to improve. When that time comes 

 Maynas, whose population is rapidly increasing, will then be the 

 first and richest province of Peru. Though other provinces may 

 boast of their mines, she possesses an inexhaustible treasure in her 

 soil and forests ; and a cheap and expeditious mode of conveyance 

 by her rivers, which can never be equalled by any of the provinces 

 of the Cordillera. 



ing the Huarapa and fermented Masata : this is very intoxicating, and at 

 the same time very pernicious. It receives its name from being drinkable 

 in twenty-four hours time. 

 • Common rum, from the juice of Sugar-cane. 



