BOUGUER'S voyage to PERU. 285 



reafon, on account of the impradicability of the roads, he was obliged to render the 

 weight as moderate as he could. He continued his route, and entered Quito on the 

 29th May, one year and fome days more, from our departure from Europe. The 

 manner of the reception of our companions in this capital is already known ; all the 

 different corporate bodies of the city haftened to congratulate them on their arrival, 

 and they were lodged in the palace until they could provide convenient houfes for 

 themfelves. 



PART II. 



TT was the i oth of June before I reached Quito, having been detained at Caracol for 

 ^ want of a carriage, and my health had fuffered confiderably by the fatigue of the jour- 

 ney from Rio Jama, and more particularly from Puerto Viejo to Guayaquil. However, 

 I fet about, in my turn, to furmount the difficulties of the chain of mountains before 

 me, which took me up feven days to accomplifh, although I did not eftimate the paf- 

 fage over at more than nine or ten leagues. But it is an extremely rugged afcent, in- 

 terrupted by an infinity of different precipices, on the brinks of which we are often 

 obliged to walk ; we are obliged too, many times to pafs a little river called Ojiva, in 

 which many people are loft every year ; though it is not a wide torrent, its rapidity is 

 frightful : we pals it for the laft time, we remove ourfelves from it, and yet we dread 

 it, fo much it feems to threaten the traveller, even when at a diftance from it, with its 

 roar. Sometimes, defcending, a deep ravine prefents itfelf, which we have difficulty 

 to get over, and often a whole day is confumed only in afcending its oppofite fide, and 

 then we find ourfelves but at a little diftance from the place we left in the jnorning. 

 The laffitude of the mules is fo great, that you muft allow them to reft and take their 

 breath every feven or eight fteps they make ; the whole journey becomes thus, although 

 very laborious, but intervals of alternate reft, and a flowly progreffive motion. 



The rain was fo heavy, and every thing, during the firft few days, fo very wet, that it 

 was not poffible to make a fire ; and we had to live on bad cheefe, and bifcuit made partly 

 of maize. We made each night, when we were not fo fortunate as to meet with a cabin 

 already conftrufted by fome other traveller, the beft bed we could of the branches of 

 trees, and their leaves. In proportion as we advanced, the heat of the torrid zone 

 abated, and we foon became fenfible of cold. When I fay I was feven days on my 

 journey, I do not reckon the ftay I made in the town called Guarenda, in the heart of 

 the Cordelier, and which prefents a fituation of reft which no perfon Ihould fail to avail 

 themfelves of The whole of my way was through woods, which terminated, as I have 

 fince fatisfied myfelf, at the height of fourteen or fifteen hundred toifes ; and when I 

 came to any ftation more open than ufual, and caft my looks behind, I could fee no- 

 thing but the immenfe forefts through which I had paffed, fpreading themfelves even to 

 the fea. I at length got to the height, and found myfelf at the foot of a mountain 

 called Chimborazo, always loaded with fnow, and all the foil covered with froft and 

 ice. The Cordelier being nothing elfe than a long range of mountains, of which an 

 infinity of its pointed fummits are loft in the clouds, it is not poffible to crofs them but 



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