368 Voyage of the Novum. 



The streets are wide and tolerably regular, but tlie^ absence 

 of gutters and the wretched foundation of the roadway pre- 

 vent their being used by carriages or horsemen, or by pedes- 

 trians even more than they can helj). The open ditches at 

 either side are full of tilth and animal impurities, which are 

 continually being thrown in, and but for the services of 

 numerous carrion crows (cathartes foetcns)^ who perform the 

 duties of scavengers, Lima, owing to the supineness of the 

 native authorities, would be one of the filthiest and most un- 

 healthy cities in South America. But the gallinazos, as these 

 black-headed birds are called by the natives, although lazy 

 and unwieldy, nevertheless are in such immense numbers here, 

 that they suffice to keep the streets comparatively free from 

 putrescent odours. Everywhere, even in the thick of places 

 of public resort, one sees these birds, which no one injures on 

 account of their usefulness, and which even the rising gener- 

 ation never think of disturbing in their disgusting avocations, 

 hopping about upon the bare ground, and gorging themselves 

 on the garbage around. 



One of the greatest improvements to the city is its almost 

 universal illumination by gas, which in the evening imparts 

 a peculiar charm to the streets and fashionable shops of 

 Lima, and enables them, in this particular at least, to vie with 

 those of the capitals of Europe. 



The largest buildings in Lima are, as we might expect 

 from a country conquered and colonized by Spaniards, the 

 churches and monasteries, of which there are in this capital 



