EFFECTS OF CONTRAST. 37 



of those high regions : so that, at length, they were 

 reconciled to continual solitude and hard living. 

 Even the diversity of temperature did not affect 

 them, when they descended from the frost-bound 

 regions, into plains and valleys, where the heat 

 though moderate, often seems intense to those un- 

 accustomed to the change. Lastly, they encoun- 

 tered without fear the dangers that are unavoidable 

 among precipices, and in untrodden deserts. 

 The little cabins of the Indians, and the stalls for 

 cattle, scattered on the skirts of the mountains, and 

 where they used to lodge in their passage from one 

 desert to another, were to them as spacious palaces; ^ . 

 mean villages seemed like splendid cities, and the Uj 

 conversation of a priest and two or three of his . | 

 companions, charmed them like the banquets of - 

 Xenophon ; the little markets too, held in the towns 

 through which they happened to pass, seemed to 

 them as if filled with all the variety of Seville fair. 

 Thus the least object became magnified, when they 

 descended from their places of exile, which often 

 continued for fifty days ; and it must be owned, 

 that at times the sufferings of these enterprising men 

 were such, that nothing could have supported and 

 encouraged them to persevere, but the high sense of 

 honour and integrity which equally induced both 

 companies not to leave imperfect a work so long 

 desired by all Europe, and especially by the sove- 

 reigns who then filled the Spanish throne. 



No less than thirty-five signals were erected by 

 Ulloa and Condamine ; thirty-two by Godin and 

 Juan. Some of these were in deserts, far above 

 those belts of vegetation, which diversify the sides 



