OF ATACAMA AND COQU1MBO. 253 



filled tho valley from side to side more than half a mile across. But the directions from which 

 they conn-, ami tin- inclin.-itinn of th-ir hods, cause a doubt whether they could have been 

 more than torrents from the Amies when rain fell more abundantly in past age*. The river 

 here, at present, is scarcely larger than about Ramadillo ; and to injure that every possible 

 portion of land may be impartially moiftmtd, it is led during alternate periods to opposite 

 sides of the ravine. So valuable are its effects, that $4,000 was paid in the preceding year lor 

 the alfalfa (lucerne) which could be cut from a dingle quadra of ground. 



As one follows the windings of the road from side to side of the narrow valley and encounters 

 so many unmistakable marks of the action of water, it is impossible to doubt that the original 

 stream once filled it to a depth navigable by vessels of considerable size. The erosions, too, 

 are not in the vertical faces of earth and gravel cliffs only, but also in granite and porphyritic 

 rocks that form projecting termini of hills abutting on the course of the ancient stream. 



Eight leagues from Copiapo is the village of Totoralillo, a straggling and untidy place. It 

 has a large establishment for the extraction of silver from the ores, and a small Posada, where we 

 passed the night at a charge of six dollars for the feed of four horses and the right to contend 

 with fleas in its comfortless beds. That the latter obtained more blood from our veins than the 

 parsimonious allowance of dried fodder imparted to those of the animals, both Don Jorje and 

 myself will make our 'davits to. The elevation of the village above the sea is rather less than 

 1,900 feet. 



On the following morning, it was no privation to leave the tormentors in bed and start 

 towards our destination an hour before daybreak ; and had it been, the appearance of the 

 heavens fully studded with stars would have amply compensated the loss. As dawn advanced, 

 and the planet Venus rose over the crest of the hills to our left, the atmosphere was so trans- 

 parent that we thought its crescent quite distinct ; and this could scarcely have been an illusion, 

 as both agreed in the direction of the line joining its cusps. When the stars faded, and in- 

 creasing daylight enabled us to perceive the aridity of the soil, a few small and dwarfish shrubs 

 high in the ravines, or an occasional venerable Algarrobo (Prosopis siliquastrum) in the midst 

 of the valley, which had been spared by the wood-hunters, were the only green objects. There 

 were no animals, and birds were both rare and diminutive. 



Five or six miles above Totoralillo the road forks : that to the left continuing beside the 

 stream to its head-waters and "Come Cavallo" pass; while the right-hand path, inclining more 

 to the south, leads to Chanarcillo. Ascending a little knoll at the separation of the roads, 

 we enter a ravine not more than a hundred yards across, with a more rapid ascent, and lying 

 between more precipitous hills. Both sides of the road are strewn with immense masses of rock 

 which earthquakes had tumbled from the cliffs above ; and the ravines, perpendicular to the prin- 

 cipal line, are partially filled with drift-sand, whose attrition has perceptibly worn off the western 

 faces of the dark strata. One of the rocks thus hurled down at three or four leagues from 

 Totoralillo has been named " El Pabellon," from its resemblance to a tent. Its height will 

 not differ greatly from ten feet, nor its base from ten feet square, the form being quite regular 

 and perfect. Algarrobos are still met with at long intervals sad tokens of departed fertility 

 amid present desolation. 



Above " El Pabellon" the inclination of the road is still more towards the coast, its general 

 direction being west of south ; and the constantly narrowing valley it winds along tells us, not 

 less emphatically than the last, of the water that formerly flowed within it. Twelve leagues 

 from Copiapo we reach " La Angostura," two narrow gorges separated from each other by an 

 elliptic basin, with a major axis of several hundred yards. The first gorge, or " Angostura" 

 proper, is only wide enough for the passage of a single cart, and so tortuous that one 

 cannot see half a bow-shot in advance. Rocks rise perpendicularly on either hand to 

 many hundred feet, sometimes sloping away from, and at others overhanging the path, their 

 apparently slight hold in situ rendering them fearful objects to pass beneath in a locality so 

 visited by subterranean convulsions. An examination of the two sides shows them wonderfully 



