THE IKKIGATION AGE. 



101 



| ON THE ROOF OF THE WORLD* 



Recently I returned from a very long journey through 

 the South American republics a journey that consumed 

 nine months of time and over 50,000 miles of travel. Leav- 

 ing New Orleans on a fruit-carrying ship that voyaged 

 along Central America, I arrived at Panama. After in- 

 vestigating the great canal, I sailed down the western 

 coast of South America, going into the interior by rivers 

 and railroads, and finally on board a vessel passed around 

 the southern end of the continent through the Straits of 

 Magellan, and then to the Falkland Islands in the Atlan- 

 tic. Later I came by ship to Buenos Aires in Argentina, 

 and went through that great country extensively, into 

 Paraguay and Uruguay and on to Brazil, up the Atlantic 

 coast, and finally to England, and from there to America. 

 During this long journey I found no country more inter- 

 sting than the high plateau regions of the Andes Moun- 

 tains in South America. 



Commencing in 

 Colombia, well 

 up toward the 

 Isthmus of Pan- 

 ama, these "hang- 

 ing valleys" and 

 broad open 

 spaces of tillable 

 land, sweep 

 southward over 

 2,000 miles along 

 the backbone of 

 the Andean 

 Range, through 

 Ecuador, Peru, 

 Bolivia, and down 

 into western Ar- 

 gentina. This 

 long, crooked, 

 broken strip of 

 country lying 

 among the moun- 

 'tain tops, men 

 have called the 

 "roof of the 

 world." certainly 

 it is the "roof" of 

 the South Ameri- 

 c a n continent. 

 From whence trie 

 ancient race of 

 people came who 

 first inhabited the 



Mr. Boyce on Shipboard. 



continent is not surely known; some say from China, 

 some say from a great island that lay in the Atlantic 

 Ocean, which afterward sank into the sea; but, at any 

 rate, they apparently found these high areas among the 

 Andes the most, pleasant and habitable. Here they 

 developed a civilization the relics of which are surprising 

 to travelers, and for years have been the study of scholars. 



Volumes could be written about these vast highlands, 

 but in this little Christmas souvenir I can only show you 

 a few pictures I took in one or two of the old cities, and 

 say a few things about their history. 



I found Cuzco in Peru, the most picturesque, perhaps, 

 of the towns of the high Andean regions. Bogota up in 

 Colombia, Quito in Ecuador, LaPaz in Boliva, are strange 

 and wonderful old capital cities, built near the clouds, but 

 Cuzco was the first capital of the Western Hemisphere 

 and the seat of power of the ancient Incas, the great race 

 of people that inhabited South America before the Span- 

 iards came; hence it is particularly interesting. 



From Lima, on the seacoast of Peru, I traveled to 

 Cuzco by a wonderful railroad that climbs the Andean 

 Range until one is over 16,000 feet above sea-level. This 

 amazing railroad, which was engineered by an American, 

 passes through sixty tunnels, one of which is 4,000 feet in 

 length, and crosses awful chasms and twists and winds to 

 and fro among the mountain peaks until one is carried 



*By W. D. Boyce, Chicago. 



above the clouds. Up in that strange country are some 

 great copper mines; one, the Cerro de Pasco, being over 

 14,000 feet above sea level, and another mining camp, 

 named Morococha, being 17,500 feet above the sea the 

 highest point where men work anywhere in the world. 

 American capitalists own threse mines. 



The scenery 

 is very grand 

 up in this high 

 region, there 

 being an east- 

 i^rn and western 

 range of moun- 

 tains, between 

 which stretch 

 the valleys and 

 broad open 

 spaces. Here 

 through S.OOfO 

 miles of coun- 

 try, north and 

 south, there are 

 impressive evi- 

 dences of a pre- 

 historic race, in 

 ruins of tem- 

 ples and old 

 cities, the foun- 

 dations of mili- 

 tary roads that 

 once were 

 splendid h i g h- 

 ways, astonish- 

 ing systems of 

 terraces on the 

 mountain sides, 



Llamas an 



Paz, Bolivia. 



where men stored and tilled the soil, and many other re- 

 mains of the skill and industry of a once powerful and 

 enlightened people. In their burial mounds have been 

 found pottery, gold and silver vessels, ornaments of rare 

 carving, and cotton twine and woven cloth, denoting 

 their expertness in manufacture. 



They drilled with drills made of pure copper, having a 

 method of tempering the metal until it was as hard as 

 steel, a method that is unknown today, being numbered 

 among the lost arts. They also built reservoirs, canals 

 and irrigating ditches. They tolerated no leisure class, 

 every one being obliged by law to work, the products 

 being divided between the government, the priests and 

 the people. 



What is definitely known of the history of this people 

 reaches back about 1,000 years. At that time there were 

 several tribes of Indians inhabiting the high plateau about 

 Cuzco, the old Inca capital, and from one of these tribes 

 rose a great leader, named Manco Capac, who claimed 

 descent from the Sun God. The word Inca means Lord, 

 and Manco Capac was the first Inca, or king. After him 

 his direct descendants ruled the vast Inca domains until 

 the Spaniards came and conquered them. 



The Incas had numerous rich gold, silver and copper 

 mines, and their wealth grew to be enormous. They were 

 splendid fighters, and one by one they conquered the other 

 Indian tribes of the great countries that are now Peru, 

 northern Chile, northwestern Argentina, Bolivia, and 

 Ecuador. Thus in time the Inca emperor ruled a vast 

 area and was monarch of over 2,000,000 hard-working 

 people. And, remember, these people were all Indians, 

 building great churches and cities and doing innumerable 

 skilful, clever things. The present Indian population of 

 the countries stretching along the "roof" of South Amer- 

 ica are their descendants. 



The basis of the religion of the ancient Incas was 

 the worship of the sun; that is, the sun was the greatest 

 visible evidence of God that they could see, so they wor- 

 shiped it. Their architecture must have been very im- 

 pressive. Their temples to the Sun God, and tKe palaces 

 of the Inca Emperor, were constructed of huge stones so 

 cut as to fit evenly one upon another, and the inside walls 

 were treasure-houses of gold and silver, ornaments and 

 decorations of precious stones. It is said that many of 

 the Inca chiefs and persons of high estate ate from solid 

 gold plates. At any rate, there was a very great deal of 



