398 THE ANDES RANGE. 



of that country is an absolute waterless desert. The 

 desert of Atacama, a wide district, rainless, herbless, and 

 hopeless, forms a portion of Bolivia where, though as in 

 all deserts, torrential rains do sometimes fall, still it 

 is said to be a fact that such an event does not occur 

 more than once in every 20 years, or perhaps in every 

 50 years; * and yet in the "Hinterland, " that is to say 

 the region behind these countries on the other side of 

 the mountains eastwards of the Andes, forests 

 of surpassing luxuriance, and well- watered lands of 

 very great fertility, exist almost everywhere. Compa- 

 ratively little is however known of this country (gener- 

 ally spoken of as the region of "La Montana"} which 

 is cut off from communications with the Atlantic 

 seaboard by the wide extent of the Brazilian dominions 

 which intervene between it and the sea, a great 

 deal of which are still a terra incognita; while to 

 the westward the mighty range of the Cordilleras 

 blocks the way quite as completely, and is only to be 

 crossed by means of very elevated passes, practicable 

 merely for pack animals, where little or nothing has 

 been done in the way of constructing permanent 

 roadways; nevertheless enough is known to show the 

 generally extremely fertile character of the country 

 eastward of the Andes, a great part of which is 

 covered with forests, whose productions, so far as they 

 have been explored, appear to be second to none other 

 on earth. It was from these forests for instance, that 

 the far-famed Peruvian bark (Cinchona Calisayd), that 

 inestimable boon to humanity, was obtained, and is 

 still to be found growing wild in great abundance 



* Stanford's Co mpendium of Geography and Travel in Central and 

 South America. Edited by H. W. Bates, 1878, p. 199. 



