PERU AND BOLIVIA. 



sea, and discharging 433,000 gallons in twenty- 

 four hours. This is the largest iron aqueduct 

 in the world. The line from the port of Ylo 

 to Moquegua is sixty-three, and, from Arica to 

 Tacna, thirty-nine miles long. There is also a 

 system of railroads in Tarapaca, from the ni- 

 trate-of-soda works to the ports, comprising 

 when finished one hundred and eighty miles. 

 All these lines were planned to meet existing 

 needs, and they tap rich and valuable districts, 

 but the great lines across the Andes were un- 

 dertaken prematurely. One passes from Oallao 

 and Lima, across the western and central Cor- 

 dilleras to Oroya in the lofty valley of Jauja, 

 and is to be one hundred and thirty-six miles 

 long. It was commenced in 1870, and rises 

 5,000 feet in the first forty-six miles. It then 

 threads intricate gorges of the Andes, along 

 the ledges of precipices, and over bridges that 

 seem suspended in the air. It tunnels the 

 Andes at an altitude of 15,645 feet, the most 

 elevated spot in the world where a piston-rod 

 is moved by steam, and will terminate at Oroya, 

 12,178 feet above the sea. There are sixty- 

 three tunnels. The bridge of Verrugas, span- 

 ning a chasm five hundred and eighty feet 

 wide, rests on three piers, the center one of 

 hollow wrought-iron, being two hundred and 

 fifty-two feet high. Of this Oroyo Railroad 

 eighty-seven miles were completed when the 

 war broke out, and it had cost 4,625,887. 

 Another line crosses the Andes from Arequipa 

 to Puno, on the shore of Lake Titicaca, which 

 was opened in 1872, and is two hundred and 

 thirty-two miles long. Steamers have been 

 launched on the lake. The whole scheme of 

 Peruvian railroads, if ever completed, would 

 have a length of 1,281 miles, private lines 496 

 miles, and two projects partly private, altogeth- 

 er 2,030 miles, and cost 37,500,000. In 1867 

 a telegraph company laid down a number of 

 lines. The rule of Colonel Balta, though ru- 

 inous to Peru from a financial point of view, 

 was throughout a period of peace and internal 

 prosperity, ending in the opening of an Inter- 

 national Exhibition at Lima. His successor, 

 Don Manuel Pardo, inaugurated August 2, 

 1872, was the first civilian who had been elect- 

 ed. He found his country loaded with a debt 

 of 60,000,000, and that a sum of 4,000,000 

 was needed to pay the annual interest. A con- 

 tract had been made with Messrs. Dry f us, of 

 Paris, in 1869, in order to pay off another debt 

 of 4,000,000 by the sale of 2,000,000 tons of 

 guano, the delivery of which was to commence 

 in 1872. But the whole of the proceeds of the 

 guano was more than absorbed in meeting the 

 liabilities created by the foreign loans. Both 

 demands could not possibly be met, and the 

 payments of the interest on the loans ceased 

 in 1876. They had been regularly met since 

 1849, and the failure was a great national mis- 

 fortune. All that the new President could do 

 was to curtail the expenditure in every branch, 

 and he hoped to bring it down to 3,000,000. 

 The customs receipts only amounted to 1,500,- 



000 in 1875, and there were no direct taxes. 

 He reduced the army, regulated Chinese immi- 

 gration, promoted the exploration of navigable 

 streams leading to the Amazon, organized an 

 efficient volume for the collection of statistics 

 and for a census, and supported the interests 

 of literature. He was the best President that 

 Peru has ever known." 



About the trade of his countrymen with Peru 

 Mr. Markham observes: "As a customer of 

 Great Britain, the Peruvian Republic held an 

 important position. In 1878 Peru received 

 woolen and cotton goods and other manufac- 

 tures from us to the value of 1,369,836. In 

 return, her exports to Great Britain in the same 

 year were worth 5,232,305. The number of 

 British vessels that entered Callao in 1877 was 

 720, of which 198 (tonnage, 194,973) were 

 sailing vessels and 522 steamers. Englishmen, 

 therefore, have material as well as moral rea- 

 sons for regretting the ruinous disasters of so 

 good a customer." 



With reference to the natural resources of 

 Peru, Mr. Markham remarks: "Peru found a 

 strange source of wealth, which was as fatal 

 to her as the great influx of gold and silver 

 was to the mother-country. The trade-winds 

 are loaded with moisture from the Atlantic, 

 which produces the rich vegetation of the 

 Amazon Valley ; but when they reach the snowy 

 ridges of the Andes the last drop of this moist- 

 ure is wrung from them, and they come down 

 to the Pacific coast without a particle. Guano 

 can only accumulate, as a valuable manure, 

 where there is no rain. The great deposits of 

 nitrate of soda have also been formed in des- 

 erts where there is no rain. The exhausted 

 lands of the Old World needed these manures, 

 the farmers were willing to pay high prices for 

 them, and there were vast deposits on the isl- 

 ands and headlands and in the deserts of Peru. 

 A wise government would have treated this 

 source of revenue as temporary and extraordi- 

 nary. The Peruvians looked upon it as though 

 it were permanent, abolishing other taxes, and 

 recklessly increasing the expenditure. The 

 guano demoralized public men, and is the chief 

 cause of the country's ruin. The exportation 

 of guano commenced in 1846, and from 1851 

 to 1860 the amount of shipping that loaded at 

 the Chincha Islands represented 2,860,000 tons. 

 Between 1853 and 1872 there were 8,000,000 

 tons shipped ; and in the latter year the Chin- 

 cha Island deposits were practically exhausted. 

 But other deposits were discovered. From 

 1869 to 1871 over 800,000 tons were shipped 

 from the Guaflape Islands; and since 1874 large 

 deposits have been discovered on headlands of 

 the coast of Tarapaca. In 1875 the guano ex- 

 ports amounted to 378,683 tons, valued at 4,- 

 000,000. The deposits of nitrate of soda have 

 been worked since 1830 in the province of 

 Tarapaca, the chief ports of export being Iqui- 

 que and Pisagua. From 1820 to 1850 the ex- 

 port amounted to 239,860 tons. It reached its 

 maximum in 1875, when 326,869 tons left the 



