350 A VISIT TO THE COUNTRY. 



barley are the staple products, though each of the larger haciendas has a vineyard more or less 

 extensive. 



From one and a half to two hushels of wheat is sown broadcast on each acre, and covered in 

 by dragging brush over it, or sometimes a harrow, whose construction is on a par with that 

 of the plough. This takes place in the autumn, as soon after the rains commence as the lands 

 can be prepared. Hill-side fields, above the reach of artificial irrigation, are first attended to,, 

 that they may have time to mature under the influence of late spring rains and a warm sun. 

 About the close of spring, say during November, the crop is liable to be infested by the 

 polvillo (rust), and is sometimes attacked by an insect called capachillo, after the berry 

 is swollen and full of milk. The insects transform the grain into a shrivelled and inferior 

 quality without wholly destroying it. They are not common, and it appeared difficult to 

 obtain a sight of one ; but enough was told to satisfy me that it resembles the wheat midge 

 (Cecidomia tritici) so common in England, rather than the Hessian fly. Should rains on misty 

 nights occur during the latter part of November, and be followed by hot and cloudy days, 

 there is scarcely a field which wholly escapes rust, and many that have not a sound stalk left 

 in them, the waving heads very shortly assuming the bright color of rusted iron. As rains 

 heretofore have been very unfrequent during November,* the risk of injury is nothing like so 

 great as in the United States. 



Cultivating immense fields as do some farmers, one might suppose they would adopt the most 

 expeditious mode of reaping ; but this is not the case, and the old sickle or reaping-hook is still 

 universal. The field is laid off in sections, called tareas (tasks), each sixty varas long by forty 

 varas wide. A reaper will take as many as he thinks he can accomplish, at so much per tarea. 

 Extra hands are always hired to assist in this work. Instead of making the straw into bundles, 

 it is laid in piles ; and as the grain is usually suffered to stand longer than in the United States, 

 the loss by falling out and their mode of handling is quite considerable. A smart reaper will 

 cut a tarea in a day, if not served as an Englishman who lived near Santiago told me quite 

 exultingly he had managed with his hands. On bargaining with them he proposed to make 

 tareas fifty varas each way, instead of 60 by 40, alleging that he could better accommodate the 

 form of his field. Sixty and forty make a hundred fifty and fifty no more. Their arithmetical 

 knowledge extended no further, and, of course, no objection was made to cut square tareas. 

 Perceiving, after a day or two, that they failed to cut a tarea in the usual time, there was no 

 little discussion among the poor fellows ; but the only reason they could think of was, that the 

 days had actually become shorter. That they had unwittingly consented to cut one hundred 

 square varas more in each tarea, seemed never to enter their minds. The haciendado quieted 

 his scruples upon the ground that they had assented to the change, and therefore there was 

 no cheating on his part ! Nor were his "fair business transactions" confined to illiterate peons 

 only, a friend and myself having reason to remember his "sharpness" in our attempts to 

 recover an aerolite that had fallen near the house some years previously. 



The threshing out of the grain (trilla) is one of the annual events of most importance at the 

 hacienda. Proportionate to the amount of ground cultivated in wheat, a spot slightly elevated 

 above the rest is selected, levelled on top, and enclosed by stakes and cords. Sometimes young 

 trees are planted round it, though they are never permitted to attain any great height. As 

 fast as the wheat-stalks are cut on the field they are brought to the era (the spot thus pre- 

 pared) and piled.up, until there is not unfrequently formed a hill very respectably sized even 

 for this mountainous country. One may appreciate this from the fact that "La Compania," a 

 single estate formerly belonging to the Jesuits (Compania de Jesus), produces annually more 

 than 50,000 bushels of wheat. f As.soon as the pile within 4he era is high enough, the inquilinos 

 are summoned and their friends invited to the frolic, the patron providing a daily feast so long 

 os the work lasts. In this, one, two, even four hundred animals are employed, mares being 



* Only eight since 1824, or an average of 2h. 02m. for that month in thirty years, 

 t The trilla of 1851 yielded 32,000 fanegas, or about 72,000 bushels ! 



