422 The Andes and the Amazons. 



It is quite a fall from one's meditations over liis fiist 

 glimpse of Titicaca to enter the Indian city of Puno. 

 The inhabitants, about 5000, are mostly Aymaras, with a 

 more interesting past than present. In sombre garb, silent 

 and sullen as nature in this latitude and altitude, they move 

 to and fro as if in mourning. They are poor and indolent ; 

 but why should they work in this sleety i-egion, which yields 

 nothing but small potatoes, ocas, poor barley, quinoa, or 

 " Peruvian rice," and caQigua ?* Wheat, oats, and corn 

 seldom come to seed at an altitude above 12,000 feet. 

 The rich buy Chilian flour at §13 a quintal. In fact, this 

 upland country owes very little to botany or agriculture ; 

 and yet the ancestors of these people thought it woith 

 while to cultivate the ground, and even terraced the 

 mountains for hundreds of feet higher than Puno. There 

 is not a tree within a hundred miles of the lake ; boards 

 from Bolivia cost 50 cents a foot, and tiles are worth §20 

 a tliousand. Timber, however, could be easily procured in 

 the mountains of Carabaya, and floated down the Azanga- 

 ro. The only fuel is llama dung, and tola, a small shrub. 

 Petroleum has been found at Pusi ; and, now that the rail- 

 way will make coal possible, fire-places may hereafter ex- 

 ist. At present, during the evenings, which are bitterly 

 cold, ladies and gentlemen take to their shawls and cloaks, 

 or to bed. The temperature of tlie day ranges from 18° at 

 sunrise to 55° at noon. The rainy season lasts from De- 

 cember to April. Earthquakes are rare and slight, com- 

 pared with those of Arequipa ; but the singular statement 

 was made to me by a resident that, for six months after 

 the great earthquake of 1868, a shock occurred regularly 

 on the 13th of each month. 



* The last two are species of Chenopodium, and are staple articles of food, 

 though not very nutritious. Ocas (Oxalis tuherosa) are small, slender pota- 

 toes. 



