CHAPTER XYIII. 



OVEK THE EASTERX COEDIIXERA. 



Amazonian Forest. — Preparations for our Journey. — Our Artist's Grave. — 

 Eeligious Intolerance. — Across the Valley. — Mimosas. — Hacienda of 

 Itulcachi. — Tablon. — Sunset among the Andes. — The Home of the 

 Incas. — Indigenous Civilizations. — Condors. — Over the Crest. — View 

 of the Amazonian Valley. — First Waters of the Great River. — Andean 

 Eoad. — Eeception at Pajiallacta. — Indian Burial. — Arrangements for 

 our March to the Napo. 



Resting liigb upon the eastern slope of the Andes, 

 lies the flank of the great forest which throws its dense 

 shade over the larger portion of the Amazonian Valley. 

 From the Andes it stretches two thousand miles eastward 

 to the Atlantic, and from the Llanos of Venezuela upon 

 the north sweeps southward, without a break, to the Pam- 

 pas of Buenos Ayres. The depths of that primeval forest 

 have, for ages, been known only as the home of warring 

 tribes of wild Indians ; the hum of civilization has scarcely 

 approached its borders, and to-day its deepest solitudes 

 are unbroken save by the never-ceasing rush of its hurry- 

 ing rivers. So impenetrable is that tropical forest, that 

 the interior of South America would have been forever 

 closed against man, were it not for the paths ploughed by 

 powerful rivers through its tangled mazes. A hundred 

 streams, leaping down from the Andes, tear open passages 

 all along the western front of the foi'est, and then join 



