Chimboeazo. 45 



and, though under the equator, out of the tropics too. The 

 fresh mountain breeze and the chilly mists announced a 

 change of climate.* Fevers and dysenteries, snakes and 

 musquitoes, the plantain and the palm, we had left behind. 

 Camino Real is a huddle of eight or ten dwellings perch- 

 ed on the summit of a sierra a thousand feet higher than 

 the top of Momit Washington. The views from this stand- 

 point compensate for all past troubles. The wild chaos of 

 mountains on every side, broken by profound ravines, the 

 heaps of ruins piled up during the lapse of geologic ages, 

 the intense azure of the sky, and the kingly condor majes- 

 tically wheeling around the still higher pinnacles, make up 

 a picture rarely to be seen. Westward, the mountains tum- 

 ble down into hills and spread out into plains, which, in the 

 far distant horizon, dip into the great Pacific. The setting 

 sun turns the ocean into a sheet of liquid fire. Long col- 

 umns of purple light shoot up to the zenith, and as the last 

 point of the sun sinks beneath the horizon, the stars rush 

 out in full splendor ; for at the equator day gives place to 

 night with only an hour and twenty minutes of twilight. 

 The mountains are Alpine, yet grander than the Alps ; not 

 so ragged as the granite peaks of Switzerland, but with 

 rounder heads. The prospect down this occidental slope is 

 diversified by deep valleys, landslides, and flowering trees. 

 Magnificent are the views eastward, 



" Where Andes, giant of the western star, 

 Looks from his throne of clouds o'er half the world." 



The majestic dome of Chimboi-azo was entirely uncovered 

 of clouds, and presented a most splendid spectacle. There 

 it stood, its snow-white summit, unsullied by the foot of 

 man, towering up twice as high as Etna. For many years 



* The altitude of 7000 feet is the usual limit of the rain-line on the west 

 slope of the Andes. The condensation which produces rain takes place at 

 the equator two or three times higher than in our latitude. 



