LIMA. 



The building for bull-fights, called a Plaza Firme de Acho, is an amphitheatre near the 

 northeast quarter of San Lazaro, capable of seating more than ten thousand persons. Its arena 

 is four hundred feet in diameter, above and receding from which the boxes and benches rise step 

 by step. These are supported on brick pillars, the lowest eight feet above the floor of the 

 arena. Each tier is accessible by a stairway on the outside. In former times the exhibitions 

 here were of greater interest than any other public diversion. For days in advance nothing 

 else was talked of, and hours before the appointed time thousands thronged the thoroughfare 

 leading to the spectacle. All Lima was in holiday attire. Even ladies the most elegant and 

 refined of the age, and dressed in the most costly style, took equal pleasure with the ruder sex 

 in the barbarous show, loudly applauding when an infuriated animal, which had perhaps torn 

 the bowels from three or four horses and maimed for life two or three less experienced combat- 

 ants, was at last dexterously slain. Of late years public sentiment is somewhat changed, and 

 few ladies care to acknowledge openly their admiration of such inhuman sport. Those who do 

 attend disguise themselves in the saya y manto, a costume that effectually prevents recognition 

 by their own husbands or brothers. Formerly, when such costume was fashionable, it may 

 well be conceived how tantalizing it was to remain near a Limena all of whom were noto- 

 riously famed for exquisitely formed persons, small feet, and graceful carriage, so well displayed 

 by the saya and to feel that one eye was bent on you through the manto, whilst the features 

 by which it was surrounded remained an unseen picture. European fashions having driven 

 them out of vogue; the dress is now rarely seen, except on feast days and Sundays (I am told). 

 It is regarded rather as a screen to a somewhat tarnished reputation than the garb of modest 

 women. 



Just to the northward of the palace, a substantial stone bridge over the Rimac unites the two 

 portions of the city. Its roadway nearly forty feet above the three or four babbling rivulets 

 composing the river is more than 500 feet long, and is supported on six strong arches which 

 have resisted earthquakes during more than two centuries, although almost everything else has 

 been twice overthrown. There are elevated footways for pedestrians, and benches with para- 

 pets for the weary. In the afternoons and evenings of summer it is a scene of much gayety, 

 as all passing to enjoy a ride or promenade in the Alameda, or to partake of the cool and 

 refreshing air that descends with the current of the river, must pass over the bridge. Neither 

 the plaza nor the smaller public squares have been planted ; and except the arcades on two sides 

 of the former, they are not resorted to as places of promenade. All the fashionables may be 

 found about sunset in the Alameda, a long and shaded walk extending from the northeast 

 quarter of the city along the banks of the river, from which streamlets have been led to water 

 its rows of orange and willow trees. There are frequent ranges of seats its entire length, and it 

 is quite customary for ladies to leave their elegant carriages to pass an hour in the cool and 

 pleasant fragrance of this charming walk. 



In 1849, market was held in the square near the Chamber of Deputies ; subsequently it was 

 removed to an ill-contrived building three or four squares to the south. Here one may find 

 Indians from the interior with fruits, vegetables, and flowers ; Indians from the coast with fish ; 

 Indians from the city with butcher's meat, bread, and manufactured goods ; and Indian servants 

 as purchasers. Creole Spaniards frequent the place in no capacity ; and though negroes and 

 their admixtures form a numerous portion of the denizens about the market, the mass are 

 unmistakably " Children of the Sun." They are a short, stout-built race, with many of the 

 prominent physiognomic characteristics of the North American tribes ; and the idols belonging 

 to their ancestors, that are still occasionally disinterred, prove that the lapse of centuries has 

 wrought little change in the national cast of features. 



The supply of vegetables and fruits is extensive and of excellent quality. Fine potatoes 

 (both sweet and Irish), cauliflowers, beets, pumpkins, radishes, beans, pine-apples, cherimoyas, 

 peaches, paltas, pepinos, mangos, oranges, lemons, &c., are very abundant. As all the pine- 

 apples for sale had been shorn of their leaves, it is probabl that they had been brought from a 



