54 NOTES OF A BOTANIST CHAP.XV, 



The town occupies a series of terraces, from 200 

 to 300 feet below the hill-top ; but except in what 

 is called the plaza, where the church, convent, 

 and government house the last appropriated to 

 the lodging of strangers occupy three sides of a 

 square, scarcely anywhere is there the semblance 

 of a street or square. The nature of the ground 

 is partly the cause of this, for the rains have 

 worn narrow zigzag ravines, called zanjas, 40 feet 

 or more deep, and with perpendicular sides, that 

 radiate from the convex summit in all directions ; 

 so that two houses only a few paces apart may 

 be separated by an impassable gulf, and even in 

 the daytime it is necessary to take heed to one's 

 steps, while by night the town is actually impass- 

 able for a stranger. It should be added that a 

 bridge, even in the shape of a simple plank, is a 

 luxury unknown in the land of the Motilones. 

 The scanty clothing worn for decency's sake in 

 that warm region is soon dried up by the sun and 

 wind after wading through one of the streams, 

 even up to the neck. The zanjas widen down- 

 wards, and from their sandy bed distils a deliciously 

 cool and clear water, which is made to collect here 

 and there in little wells, covered in with a fiat 

 stone, and is used by the inhabitants for all 

 domestic purposes. 



[The drawing here reproduced was made by 

 Spruce during his two days' stay here (as stated on 

 p. 60). It shows the plaza from a slight elevation, 

 the irregular houses around it, the two- towered 

 church and convent, with a detached bell-tower at 

 some distance, as at Yurimaguas ; the whole backed 

 by the forest-clad Tarapoto mountains. This was 



