VALPARAISO. 



185 



by a wild Indian enemy, threatened by the regular troops and ships 

 of Chile, with no communication direct or indirect from the mother 

 country ; he has never faltered for a single instant. 



August 12th. — Mr. D came to breakfast, and to escort me to 



Con con, a parish about fifteen miles from hence, lying on the great 

 river of Aconcagna, which flows from the pass of the Andes called 

 the Cumbre, and waters the fertile valley of Santa Rosa and the 

 garden-land of Quillota. The ride is pleasant, although most of the 

 road is so bad that it would scarcely be deemed passable in England ; 

 but I have seen worse in the Appenines. It winds in many places 

 along the edges of precipices. From Valparaiso to Vina a la Mar, 

 upon the little river Margamarga, the scenery is the same as that 

 immediately about the port. Steep hills and rocks mostly covered 

 with flowering shrubs ; little cultivation except in the glens, which, 

 formed by the rivulets, open to the sea, and where gardens and patches 

 of barley surround every hut. The ocean is always in sight ; some- 

 times breaking at the foot of the high rocks we passed over, and 

 sometimes washing gently in upon the yellow sands at the mouth 

 of the streams from the cultivated valleys. At Vina a la Mar, a fine 

 estate belonging to a branch of the Carrera family, the scenery begins 

 to change. The plain there is wide and open, the vineyard and po- 

 trero very extensive; the shrubs assume almost the appearance of trees; 

 on the hills there are frequent plots of fine grass, where sheep and 

 cattle find abundant pasture ; and the palm here and there adorns 

 the sides of the vales. The near view is like some of the finest parts 

 of Devonshire ; but the hills of Quillota, over which the volcano of 

 Aconcagua, which forms a remarkable point in the central ridge of 

 the Andes, towers, render it unlike any thing in England, I might say 

 in Europe. The high mountains of Switzerland are always seen from 

 a point extremely elevated ; but here, from the sea-shore, the whole 

 mass of the cordillera rises at once, at only ninety miles' distance. 

 This gives a peculiarity to the landscape of Chile which distinguishes 

 it, even more than its warm colour, from any I have seen before. 

 The proprietor of Vina a la Mar is improving his estate in every 

 way ; miles of new fences are rising, thickets are disappearing, corn 



B B 



