2.S6 FERTILITY OF THE PLAINS. [chap. xii. 



white vapour curling into the ravines, beautifully represented 

 little coves and bays ; and here and there a solitary hillock 

 peeping up, showed that it had formerly stood there as an 

 islet. The contrast of these flat valleys and basins with 

 the irregular mountains, gave the scenery a character which 

 to me was new and very interesting. 



From the natural slope to seaward of these plains, they 

 are very easily irrigated, and in consequence singularly 

 fertile. Without this process the land would produce 

 scarcely anything, for during the whole summer the sky is 

 cloudless. The mountains and hills are dotted over with 

 bushes and low trees, and excepting these the vegetation is 

 very scanty. Each landowner in the valley possesses a 

 certain portion of hill-country, where his half-wild cattle, 

 in considerable numbers, manage to find sufficient pasture. 

 Once every year there is a grand "rodeo," when all the 

 cattle are driven down, counted, and marked, and a certain 

 number separated to be fattened in the irrigated fields. 

 Wheat is extensively cultivated, and a good deal of Indian 

 corn : a kind of bean is, however, the staple article of food 

 for the common labourers. The orchards produce an over- 

 flowing abundance of peaches, figs, and grapes. With all 

 these advantages, the inhabitants of the country ought to 

 be much more prosperous than they are. 



August i6th. — The major-domo of the Hacienda was 

 good enough to give me a guide and fresh horses ; and in 

 the morning we set out to ascend the Campana, or Bell 

 Mountain, which is 6400 feet high. The paths were very 

 bad, but both the geology and scenery amply repaid the 

 trouble. We reached, by the evening, a spring called the 

 Agua del Guanaco, which is situated at a great height. 

 This must be an old name, for it is very many years since 

 a guanaco drank its waters. During the ascent I noticed 

 that nothing but bushes grew on the northern slope, whilst 

 on the southern slope there was a bamboo about fifteen feet 

 high. In a few places there were palms, and I was 

 surprised to see one at an elevation of at least 4500 feet. 

 These palms are, for their family, ugly trees. Their stem 

 is very large, and of a curious form, being thicker in the 

 middle than at the base or top. They are excessively 

 numerous in some parts of Chile, and valuable on account 

 of a sort of treacle made from the sap. On one estate near 

 Petorca they tried to count them, but failed, after having 

 numbered several hundred thousand. Every year in the 



