38 PHYSIOGNOMY OF PLANTS. 



for snow is " ritti." On the other hand, my learned friend 

 Professor Buschmann remarks that in the Chinchaysuyo 

 dialect (spoken north of Cuzco up to Quito and Pasto,) 

 raju (the / apparently guttural) signifies snow; see the 

 word in Juan de Figueredo's notice of Chinchaysuyo 

 words appended to Diego de Torres Rubio, Arte, y Yoca- 

 bulario de la Lengua Quichua, reimpr. en Lima, 1754 ; 

 fol. 222, b. For the two first syllables of the name of 

 the mountain, and for the village of Chimbo, (as chimpa 

 and chimpani suit badly on account of the a), we may find 

 a definite signification by means of the Quichua word 

 chimpu, an expression used for a coloured thread or fringe 

 (serial de lana, hilo 6 borlilla de colores), for the red of 

 the sky (arreboles), and for a halo round the sun or 

 moon. One may try to derive the name of the mountain 

 directly from this word, without the intervention of the 

 village or district. In any case, and whatever the etymology 

 of Chimborazo may be, it must be written in Peruvian 

 Chimporazo, as we know that the Peruvians have no b. 



But what if the name of this giant mountain should 

 have nothing in common with the language of the Incas, 

 but should have descended from a more remote antiquity ? 

 According to the generally received tradition, it was not long 

 before the arrival of the Spaniards that the Inca or Quichua 

 language was introduced into the kingdom of Quito, where 

 the Puruay language, which has now entirely perished, had 

 previously prevailed. Other names of mountains, Pichincha, 

 Ilinissa, and Cotopaxi, have no signification at all in the 

 language of the Incas, and are therefore certainly older 



