46 ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND ETHNOLOGICAL 



in small numbers. Its flesh is not eaten, except clandestinely, by the Indians. 

 The food of the llamas consists chiefly of the leaves and tender sprouts of bushes. 

 As contradictory of tlie general belief that Pacos Avill not travel excepting in herds, 

 I would state that one accompanied me on my travels for several weeks. 



The inhabitants of Honduras boast, and justly, that they have no lunatics or 

 suicides. In that country I met with but one case of idiocy in a lesser degree ; 

 which is rare all over Central America. In the mountainous regions of the Andes 

 idiocy and imperfect development of the skeleton is very common. The Indian 

 population of Central America are afldicted with a cutaneous disease, the efi'ect 

 of which is a spotted appearance of the cutis. A cutaneous disease of an ulcer- 

 ating character prevails in South America, not amongst the Indians, but amongst 

 the descendants of Europeans or persons of a mixed race. It is known under the 

 name Elrphantiasis, and is considered of such infectious character that the police 

 of Ecuador are instructed to arrest any person suspected of being affected with it. 

 Such a person is taken to Quito, and if after examination by two physicians the 

 fact is established, the person affected is sent to the Jiospicio and retained there 

 for life, secluded from the world. This is done because the disease is thought to 

 be incurable. It was impossible to find out whether this malady is of a recent 

 origin or not. However, cases of recent infection are known. One of these was 

 that of a man who visited Columbia on business, and returning afflicted with this 

 disease, infected his whole family. Besides the hospicio in Quito there is in the 

 province of Cuenca a piece of land, between two rivers, on which persons aftected 

 with tliis disease are kept under guard, and prohibited to leave. These poor wretches 

 are left to their destiny, receiving no medical attendance whatever. I visited 

 the liospicio in Quito, in which I found a hundred and ten persons, from the age 

 of nine years upwards, though none of a very advanced age, nor any of whom I 

 thought to be of pure Indian blood. Forty-five of this number were males. All 

 were afflicted with more or less destructive ulceration in the face or otlier parts of 

 the body. These ulcerations were of four different kinds. The smallest number 

 proceeded from the real Elephantians egi/jJtiaca, while some were unmistakably 

 of a syphilitic nature; and others again were Lupus ; the diagnosis of the rest was 

 quite impossible to make out from a single inspection. All of these ulcers were 

 in a most deplorably neglected condition, which rendered any true diagnosis at first 

 sight almost impossible. One thing is certain; that, under the name of Elephant- 

 iasis, various diseases are embraced, on account of their not yielding to the appli- 

 cation of drugs, with the neglect of all hygienic regulations. Moved by the feeling 

 of humanity, I resolved to try and rescue some of these wretches from their 

 deplorable condition. To this end I proposed to the government to devote my 

 knowledge and time during my stay in Quito to these wretches, if the government 

 would furnish me with all the hygienic and therapeutic means I should require. 

 This offer was not accepted, the government having spent, in former years, money 

 for the cure of these unhappy ones without success ; and as the native doctors, who 

 have seen the disease during many years, were unsuccessful, how could a foreigner, 

 only recently acquainted witli it, succeed better'? However, a physician of high 

 standing in the city came to me to buy my recipe for curing the malady, offering 



