21 6 - CONDAMFNE S TRAVELS 



As the mefhes of this net are very wide, and would fuffer the foot to go between them, 

 a fort of flooring is fuperinipofed, confifl:ing of branches and fhrubs. It will "readily be 

 conceived, that the weight of this net-work, but efpecially that of the paflenger, mull 

 give a confiderable curve to the bridge ; and when, in addition, one reflefts that the 

 traveller pafTmg it is expofed to great ofcillations, to which it is incident, particularly 

 when the wind is high, and he reaches near the middle, this kind of bridge, which is 

 oftentimes thirty fathoms long, mufl needs have fomething frightful in its afpeQ: : the 

 natives, however, who are far from being naturally intrepid, pafs fuch bridges on the 

 trot, with their loads on their fhoulders, together with the faddles of the mules, which 

 crdfs the river by fwimming, and laugh at the timidity of the traveller who hefitates to 

 venture. But this is not the moft fmgular nor mod dangerous fort of bridge ^in the 

 country ; I fhall, however, omit defcription of the reft, that I may not wander too far 

 from my fubjedt. 



I repeated, on pafling Loxa, my obfervations on the latitude, and the height of the 

 mercury on the barometer, and therefults agreed with thofe obtained, in 1737, on my 

 journey to Lima. Loxa is lefs elevated than Quito by about 350 toifes, and the heat 

 is there fenfibly greater. The neighbouring mountains are but paltry hills compared 

 with thofe of the neighbourhood of Quito ; but, neverthelefs, their ridges are the par- 

 tition-lines of the courfes of rivers ; and the very hill on which the beft Quinquina 

 grows, two leagues fouth of Loxa, and called Caxanuma, gives birth to ftreams which 

 flow wefliward to the fouthern ocean, and eafl:ward, after merging in the Maraiion, to 

 the Atlantic. 



The 3d of June, I fpent the whole day on one of thefe mountains ; though aflifl:ed 

 by two Americans of die neighbourhood, whom I took with me for guides, I was able 

 to colled no more than eight or nine young plants of Quinquina in a proper fl:ate for 

 tranfportation. Thefe I caufed to be planted, in earth taken from the fpot, in a cafe 

 of fuitable fize, and had them carried on the flioulders of a man confl;antly in my fight, 

 to the place at which I embarked, hoping to preferve, at leafl:, fome of the plants, to 

 leave under charge at Cayenne, if they fhould not, on my arrival there, be in fit con- 

 dition for tranfporting to France for the King's garden. 



Between Loxa and Jaen, the Icfl: hills of the Cordilleras are pafled. The road, on 

 almofl: all this journey, lays through woods, where rain is fo ;nceflant, that it prevails 

 eleven and fometimes the whole twelve months of the year, fo that nothing can be 

 kept dry. The bafliets covered with ox-hides, which are the packages ufed in the 

 country, rot, and exhale an intolerably ofFenfive fmell. I pafled by two towns,, which 

 now have only their names, Loyola, and Valladolid ; both, a century back, were 

 opulent, and teeming with Spaniards ; but, at prefent, they are reduced to wretched 

 hamlets of Americans or Mefl:ees, and removed- from their original fite. Jaen itfelf, 

 which is fl:yled a city, and fliould be the refidence of the governor, is now but a mifer- 

 able village. Such, indeed, has been the general fate of the major part of thefe towns 

 of Peru, built at a dift:ance from the fea, and out of the high road from Carthagena to 

 Lima. On this route I crofl*ed a variety of rivers, fome by fording, others by means of 

 bridges fimilar to that I have defcribed ; others again on rafts, conftrutted on the fpot 

 of the timber with which nature has prodigally filled all thefe forefts. Thefe rivers 

 united form one of great breadth and rapidity, called Chinchipe, fuperior in volume 

 to the Seine. I defcended it the fpace of five leagues on a raft to Tomependa, an Ame- 

 rican village, within fight of Jaen, in a pleafant pofition at the confluence of three 

 great rivers, the middlemoft of which is Maraiion. On the fouthern fide it receives the 

 Ghachapoyas, on the weiteriii that of Chinchipe, down which I floated. 



This 



