Cii. XL SOUTH AMERICA. 465 



larger and smaller vessels of both kinds of earth used 

 in making and keeping the chicha. 



Amoiíg the gold pieces are the nose-jewels, 

 which in form resemble the foot of a chalice, and 

 very little less : these were appended to the sep- 

 tum, which divides the two nostrils. There are 

 also found collars, bracelets, and ear-pendants, re- 

 sembling the nose-jewels : but all these are no thicker 

 than paper: the idols, \vhich are at full length, are 

 every where hollow within ; and as they are all of 

 one piece, without any mark of soldering, the me- 

 thod they used in making them is not easily con- 

 ceived. If it be said that they were cast ; still 

 the difficulty remains, how the mould could be of 

 such a fragility as to be taken away without dama- 

 ging works, which, in all their parts, are so extremely 

 thin. 



The maize has ever been the delight of the In- 

 dians ; for, besides being their food, their favourite 

 liquor chicha was made of it ; the Indian artists 

 therefore used to shew their skill in making ears of 

 it in a kind of very hard stone ; and so perfect was 

 the resemblance, that they could hardly be distin- 

 guished by the eye from nature; especially as the 

 colour was imitated to the greatest perfection; some 

 lepresented the yellow maize, some the white; and 

 in others the grains seemed as if smoke-dried by 

 the length of time they had been kept in their houses. 

 The most surprizing circumstance of the whole 

 is, the manner of their Avorking, which, when we 

 consider their want of instruments and wretched form 

 of those they had, appears an inexplicable m}'- 

 stery : for either they worked with copper tools, a 

 metal little able to resist the hardness of stones ; or, 

 to give the nice polish conspicuous on their works, 

 other stones must have been used for tools. But 

 the labour, time, and patience, requisite to make 



Vol. L H h only 



