SANTIAGO. 217 



trci|uency of tin- Sen-no's cry, though prrmittinjr .jini-l. has not tended to public security. I 

 to this, us ih. \ rail.-! the hour, HO t)ic\ \\ . i e iocoKHiiiit in perambulating the heat, and were 

 really watchmen; im\v, mi hour of interval tempts t hem to sit down when the street* an- htill 

 t.iuai.U morning, an. I .si.-. -p almost inevitahl . Many a time have UIOBC at the foot of 



Santa I jiriit I.een startled in their slumbers when the light of my lantern was turned full on 

 1 1 H i r t \ . 



To arm the police with such weapons, and, in a manner, constitute them judges in their dis- 

 triets, is to place more confidence in their integrity and self-control than can properly be trusted 

 with such a race as is the lower class of Chilenos. Subsequent to the revolutionary attempt, 

 in 1851, their number was increased to about 800, many of whom were mere boys, scarcely tall 

 enough to keep their sabres from clanking along the ground. As might have been anticipated, 

 the hoys were not inclined to depreciate their own importance, but, on the contrary, by arro- 

 gant interference, more than once created instead of quelling disturbance, using their arms 

 on half-drunken and defenceless peons for the most trivial offences. Were the force a small 

 one, or the people naturally pugnacious, there might be apology for placing swords in the hands 

 <t' the police; but neither is the case, and the existence of 800 men so armed is at once a proof of 

 disregard for the feelings of the weak, and of fear of those whom wealth renders powerful. 



By the official census of 1830, the population included within the eight wards, or districts, of 

 the city was 67,777 souls. The enumeration made in 1844 was imperfect; but, if the divisions 

 of the city remain as before, there seems to have been* a decrease in at least half the wards, 

 without proportionate increase in the others. Allowing the number in the omitted district to 

 have been the same as in 1830, the population falls short of what it was at that time 1,500 souls. 

 Yet the statistical periodicals of the latter epoch speak of Santiago as containing more than 

 80,000 people. There has been no subsequent census, but general opinion, at the present day, 

 has assigned above 90,000 souls to the capital ; and a comparison of the plans of the city inhabited 

 in 1830 and 1852, fully justifies belief in such proportionate increase. At no time can a correct 

 census be made ; the poor imagine that the officers make inquiries for the purpose of enlistments 

 or taxation, and they are even more averse to telling the truth than the marshals have found 

 some of our own countrymen. 



. If one asks a Santiaguino what proportion of his townsmen belong to the white and what to the 

 mixed races, he will tell you all, or very nearly all of them, are white an opinion which has been 

 repeated by more than one writer who never saw Santiago. But if a light copper complexion, 

 oval faces, low foreheads, close eyes, prominent cheek-bones, coarse and straight black hair, and 

 short, robust figures, are at all evidences of Indian ancestry, I cannot think that there are more 

 than one sixth who are really of pure Spanish or Caucasian origin. Even among those now 

 wealthy and in the most responsible positions, there are not a few whose features retain very 

 decided traces of their Indian mothers. Of pure Indian blood there are none to be seen, except 

 when occasionally brought to the city for a few days by returning missionaries. The docile Ma- 

 pochos, the former lords of the soil, like many of the tribes that inhabited the Atlantic States of 

 North America, have wholly disappeared from the earth. Their blood only flows mingled with 

 that of Iberians. There was a small colony of them still remaining on the banks of the Maypu, 

 and near Mellipilla, until within a few years past; but the settlement probably does not now 

 contain one individual of unadulterated blood. 



It formed no part of the policy of the adventurers who, in the sixteenth century, left Spain 

 for America to burden themselves with women ; nor were they often men of delicate or refined 

 tastes. The Indian girls were painted to them with a thousand charms ; whilst to have brought 

 one of their own countrywomen would, in most cases, have required the sanction of the church, 

 and have been attended with expenses not easily met. Although no party or body of men 

 dared trust their souls without a ghostly protector within hail, and many of them were accom- 

 panied by several of "these tonsured celibates, the latter were probably too earnestly engaged in 

 efforts to propagate Christianity among the natives to give much attention to a Moslem habit 

 28 



