212 CEOSSING THE ANDES. 



sage — but farther south, among the Andes of Peru, the 

 traveller encounters long trains of these " mountain- 

 sheep," which are admirably adapted to traversing the 

 bleak, broken passes of those snowy sierras. 



By ten we reached Camino Real, a collection of half 

 a dozen Indian huts. Unrivalled was the view which our 

 position aftbrded. The heavy clouds, that in the morning 

 lay at the foot of the Andes, now hung but a few hundred 

 feet below us, and we seemed to stand upon a precipitous 

 coast, the vapor-sea dashing its light waves about the 

 mountain-peaks which rose like islands from the surface 

 of this cloud-ocean. Such was the view to the westward. 

 In our front towered still higher ranges of the Cordilleras, 

 pushing their crests boldly upward till the low, shrubby 

 growth, struggling up the gentler slopes of the valleys, 

 gave way before the summit was nearly reached, leaving 

 their tops scarcely clothed with Alpine grasses. High 

 above all towered the peerless Chimborazo. Such are the 

 elements of grandeur entering into a view among the 

 Andes. The mind is actually oppressed by the exhibition 

 of i^ower, feels a sense of uneasiness, and in A^ain looks 

 for repose amid the liftings of the hills. 



Delaying at Camino Real only for a hasty refec- 

 tion, we again remounted and rode slowly along the brow 

 and down the slope of the sierra. The chilling winds, 

 sweeping from ofl" the ice-fields of Chimborazo, rendered 

 grateful the warmth of our ponchos. Scattered along our 

 path were the whitening bones of animals, and frequently 

 the eye would fall upon a grim human skull, crowded 

 into a small excavation in the bank, or bound to the arm 

 of a rude cross, half-buried beneath the pile of votive 

 stones thrown about it by the superstitious arrieros. In 

 a single decaying trunk we counted seven of these relics 

 of the sufierings of the poor muleteers upon these bleak 

 passes. 



