PLATEAU OF CAXAMARCA. 285 



the Cerro de la Lin and on the Chupiquiyacu, and gold in 

 Curumayo (where native sulphur is also found in the quartz 

 rock as well as in the Brazilian Itacolumite). "We inhabited 

 near the mines the small mountain town of Micuipampa, 

 which is 11140 (11873 English) feet above the level of the 

 sea, and where, though only 6 43' from the equator, water 

 freezes in the house nightly throughout a large portion of 

 the year. In this desert devoid of vegetation live three or 

 four thousand persons, who are obliged to have all their 

 means of subsistence brought from the warm valleys, as they 

 themselves only rear some kinds of kale and excellent salad. 

 Tn this wilderness, as in every town in the high mountains of 

 Peru, ennui leads the richer class of persons, who are not on 

 that account more cultivated or more civilised, to pass their 

 time in deep gambling : thus wealth quickly won is still 

 more quickly dissipated. There is much that reminds one 

 of the soldier of Pizarro's troop, who, after the pillage of the 

 temple at Cuzco, complained that he had lost in one night 

 at play "a great piece of the sun" (a gold plate). I 

 observed the thermometer at Micuipampa at 8 in the morning 

 1, and at noon 7 Reaumur (34.2 and 47.8 Fahrenheit). 

 We found among the thin blades of Ichhu-grass (perhaps 

 our Stipa eriostachya), a beautiful Calceolaria (C. sibthor- 

 pioides), which we should not have expected at such an 

 elevation. 



Not far from the town of Micuipampa, in a high plain 

 called Llanos or Pampa de Navar, there have been found 

 throughout an area of above an English geographical square 

 mile, immediately under the turf, and as it were intertwined 



