452 FIRST EXPERIENCES IN CHILE. 



is about eight hundred feet above the sea. Here the birlochero claimed an hour's delay, to 

 enable him to collect his horses in the vicinity ; an indulgence which four hours and a half in a 

 cramped position, with alternate showers of mist and dust in my eyes, induced me to yield very 

 readily. 



October 26. One, two, three! hours had passed, and still there was no sound of approaching 

 horses' feet to relieve the impatience each moment rendered more irksome. Tired with alter- 

 nately pacing the short paved trottoir in front of the posada, and lingering over the old news- 

 papers on its tables, as day began to lighten the dense fog, a start was made with the same 

 animals that had brought us from Valparaiso ; I, in ignorance, hoping we should be able to hire 

 fresh horses by the way ; the birlochero expecting that his own herd would overtake us before 

 we could reach the first considerable eminence on the plain. Many a time did he look back as 

 he thwacked the tired beasts into a moderate trot, muttering oaths "not loud but deep," and 

 shaking his clenched fist earnestly towards invisible delinquents. 



Broad daylight found us still trotting over the slightly rolling plain between hedges made 

 musical by the matins of many birds in their (spring) gala robes, and charming to the sight 

 by flowers of various colors. The air was loaded with the perfume of Acacia cavenia flowers, 

 which are in such profusion that the trees are cut down to repair hedges. By the roadside, the 

 dwellings of the peasantry are of the most comfortless description ; mostly a few wattled canes or 

 sticks, thatched with straw, and sometimes plastered with mud, though rarely whitewashed. 

 The occupants are in keeping with them a swarthy and unwashed race, whose every feature 

 and motion betray want of energy and intelligence. Of moderate height, well formed though 

 small limbs, tolerably prominent cheek-bones, and straight black hair, their origin cannot 

 be mistaken ; but these characteristics are not so distinctly marked as among the Peruvian 

 Indians. Huge wagons containing merchandise from the port, or sacks of flour from the mills 

 of the city, were met every mile or two. They were, ordinarily, in trains of four or five wag- 

 ons, each having an arched thatch roof, covered neatly with raw hide, and being drawn by four 

 or six yoke of well-conditioned oxen. They are kept in tidy and serviceable condition, and the 

 carreteros are neat, well behaved, and good-natured fellows. 



Within a little more than three leagues of Casa-blanca begins the ascent of the Cuesta Zapata, 

 the first considerable eminence to be crossed. The road is cut in a winding line in the faces of 

 the hill to an elevation of 1,850 feet above the sea, and its ascent is tedious from either side. 

 Fortunately, near the western base we obtained assistance from a traveller on horseback ; and 

 relieving the vehicle from my weight, it was drawn up without much difficulty. At the 

 summit a fresh southwest wind was driving clouds close to the face of the mountain into the 

 eastern valley, and entirely obscuring everything more than a rod or two distant. Of course 

 the birlochero was unable to see whether his reliefs were coming across the plain we had just 

 left. Pushing rapidly down, and then slowly over a rolling country (for our tired beasts could 

 scarcely move), we reached the village of Curacavi to early breakfast. Its distance from Casa- 

 blanca is 25 miles, from Santiago 28 ; and the elevation above the sea is 550 feet. Within half 

 an hour our cavalcade overtook us. 



Fast and furiously drove the birlochero over the next four leagues, starting multitudes of 

 field-rats and carrion hawks (Caracaras) from their enjoyments by the roadside. Nor did he 

 cease the pace until we had partially ascended the Cuesta Prado, a mountain belonging to the 

 range that bounds the great valley of Chile on the west. The ascent to be overcome from the 

 west side is about 1,700 feet; and, as the slope of the mountain is more rapid than Zapata, 

 the zigzags are shorter and steeper. Alighting, to relieve the horses from my weight and to 

 admire more closely the novel flowers by the roadside, I was amply repaid for the fatigue it 

 occasioned : the sun was gaining power, arid as his beams touched the ascending volumes of 

 misty vapor they were converted into cumuli, between whose interstices flashed stray pencils of 

 light, that curiously illuminated the dark verdant slope of the opposite ravine. 



Taking advantage of a by-path followed by equestrians and cattle, I was able to reach the 



