PlCHLNCHA. 133 



senting two pyramidal peaks, tlie highest seventeen thou- 

 sand feet above the sea, and Corazon, so named from its 

 heart-shaped summit, till we reach Pichincha, whose smok- 

 ing crater is only five miles distant in a straight line from 

 the city of Quito, or eleven by the traveled route. 



The crown of this mountain presents three groups of 

 rocky peaks. The most westerly one is called Rucu-Pi- 

 chincha, and alone manifests activity. To the northeast of 

 E.UCU is Guagua-Pichincha, a ruined flue of the same fiery 

 furnace ; and between the two is Cundur-guachana.* Pi- 

 chincha is the only volcano in Ecuador which has not a true 

 cone-crater. Some violent eruption beyond the reach of 

 history or tradition has formed an enormous funnel-shaped 

 basin 2500 feet deep,t 1500 in diameter at the bottom, and 

 expanding upward to a width of three fom^ths of a mile. 

 It is the deejjest crater on the globe. That of Kilauea is 

 GOO feet ; Orizaba, 500 ; Etna, 300 ; Hecla, 100. Vesuvius 

 is a portable furnace in comparison. The abyss is girt 

 mth a ragged wall of dark trachyte, which rises on the in- 

 side at various angles between 45° and perpendicularity. 

 As we know of but one American besides the members of 

 our expedition (llr. Farrand, a photographer) who has suc- 

 ceeded in entering the crater of this interesting volcano, we 

 will give a brief sketch of our visit. 



Leaving Quito in the afternoon by the old arched gate- 

 way at the foot of Panecillo, and crossing a spm- of the 

 mountain, we stopped for th« night at the Jesuit hacienda, 

 situated in the beautiful valley of Lloa, but nearly ruined 

 by tlie earthquake of 1859. On the damp walls of this 

 monastery, perched 10,268 feet above the ocean, we found 

 several old paintings, among them a copy of the Visitation 



* Pichincha, in the Inca language, signifies " the boiling mountain ;" Eucu 

 means old ; Guagua. young ; and Cundur-guachana, the condor's nest. 

 t More accurately, 2527 feet; Wisse and Moreno made it 2100. 



