Cii VII. SOUTH AMERICA. 95 



and flowers, than in the diilerence of winter and 

 summer. 



Before the earthquake in 1687, when this city 

 suffered in so deplorable a manner, the harvests of 

 wheat and barley were sufficient to supply the wants 

 of the country without any importation, especially 

 of wheat ; but by this convulsion of nature, the soil 

 was so vitiated, that the wheat rotted soon after it 

 w^as sown, occasioned, probably, by the vast clouds 

 of sulphureous particles then exhaled, and the prodi-- 

 gious quantities of nitrous effluvia diffused through it. 

 This obliged the owners of the lands to apply them to 

 other uses, and accordingly many of them were turned 

 into meadows of clover, plantations of sugar-canes, 

 and other vegetables, which they found not subject 

 to the same misfortune. After the land had conti- 

 nued forty years in this state of sterility, the husband- 

 men began to perceive such alteration in the soil, as 

 promised a speedy return to its former goodness. 

 Accordingly some trials were successfully made with 

 wheat, and by degrees that grain was found to 

 thrive as before that dreadful event. But whether 

 it be from the other plants, which have been culti- 

 vated in those parts, or from any mistrust of the 

 husbandmen, the same quantity has not been sowa 

 as before. It is natural to think that the late dread-^ 

 ful earthquake must have had the same pernicious 

 effects on the soil ; though by means of the establish- 

 ment of the corn trade with Chili since that time, 

 the consequences will not be so sensibly felt. The 

 fields in the neighbourhood of Lima are chiefly 

 sown with clover, of which there is here a consump - 

 tion not to be parallelled in any other place : it being 

 the common fodder for all beasts, particularly the 

 mules and horses, of which there is an inconceivable 

 number. 



The other parts of the country are taken up with 



plantations alreadv mentioned, among which those 



*, of 



