The Atmosphere of Quito. 97 



CHAPTEE VI. 



Astronomic Virtues of Quito. — Flora and Fauna of the Valley of Quito. — 

 Primeval Inhabitants of the Andes. — Quichua Indians. 



Quito, with a position unparalleled for astronomical 

 purposes, has no observatory. The largest telescope in the 

 city is about five feet long, but the astute professor of nat- 

 ural pliilosophy in the Jesuit College who has charge of it 

 had not the most distant idea that an eclipse of the sun 

 would occur on the 29th of August, and an eclipse of the 

 moon fifteen days later. In ancient days this " holy city" 

 had within it the Pillar of the Sun, which cast no shadow 

 at noon, and a temple was built for the god of light. The 

 title of the sovereign Inca was the Child of the Sun ; but 

 there was very little knowledge of astronomy, for, being 

 the national religion, it was beyond the reach of scientific 

 speculation. 



The atmosphere of Quito is of transparent clearness. 

 Humboldt saw the poncho of a horseman with the naked 

 eye at a horizontal distance of ninety thousand feet. The 

 sky is of a dark indigo color; the azure is less blended 

 with white because of the extreme dryness of the air. 

 The stars stand out with uncommon brilliancy, and the 

 dark openings between them the great German compared 

 to " tubes through which we look into the remotest depths 

 of space." It is true at Quito, as Humboldt noticed at 

 Cumana, that the stars do not twinkle when they are more 

 than fifteen degrees high; "the soft planetary light" of 

 the stars overhead is not mere rhetoric. 



Living under the equatorial line, Quitonians enjoy the 

 G 



