Mr Cruckshanks's Excursion from Lima to Pasco. \\~> 



but the showers are only experienced occasionally ; a few leagues 

 higher up, they fall constantly during the mountain winter. 



" At the end of two leagues, we came to Santa Rosa de Quive, 

 a small place consisting now only of a few huts on the hill-side ; 

 a church and some houses in the valley having been destroved 

 by fire during the revolution. Here we halted for the night. 

 The little hut where we stopped was not large enough to con- 

 tain one-third of our party ; but being on an eminence far above 

 the valley, there was no danger in sleeping out of doors, and we 

 therefore took up our quarters in an open shed. 



" June 23d. — Having been fortunate in escaping the attacks 

 of mosquitoes, which are numerous in the valley, we rose at day- 

 break, and started as soon as our numerous beasts could be laden 

 and saddled. 



" Though seated on a natural platform, far above the valley, 

 the inhabitants of Yazo are very subject to intermittent fever, and 

 the place has a bad name, on that account, among those who tra- 

 vel to Pasco ; but there can be no doubt that the people bring 

 the germ of the disease from below. They work all day in small 

 pieces of irrigated land in the narrow valley, where the heat is 

 increased by the reverberation of the sun's rays from the steep 

 rocky mountains, which, at the same time, prevent a free circu- 

 lation of air ; and, from the clearness of the sky, they are exposed 

 after sunset to a sudden chill, while surrounded by a moist stag- 

 nant atmosphere in this confined situation. I was obliged to put 

 up here on my return, and, although I had just recovered from 

 a severe attack of the fever, I found no bad effects from sleeping 

 in an open shed. 



" The hills near Yazo are very steep, and the road occasionally 

 very narrow, especially in one part, where it forms a mere ledge 

 on the side of a nearly perpendicular hill. A pass of this sort 

 is called a ladera. The bank above, consisting of large rolled 

 stones imbedded in gravel, bore evidence of the heavy rains in 

 winter, being ploughed into numerous channels, and at that sea- 

 son it must be dangerous to pass. From some of the loose earth 

 giving way during the earthquake in 1828, a man and several 

 mules were precipitated into the valley and killed. 



" At Huarimayo, there was only a single hut. where travel- 



