CHAP. XIV. THE ASCENT OF COTOCACHl. 259 



able from that direction, on account of earthquake fissures, and 

 were advised to proceed to the village of Cotocachi, and seek the 

 good oflfices of the Priest. On the 22nd of April we went there, 

 and found him high up on a scaffolding, acting as master-builder 

 for a new church, surrounded by scores of his parishioners, busy as 

 bees. A good man was this Priest. He lodged and fed us, wrote 

 a letter of recommendation to the owner of the highest property 

 on the mountain, and got us off at 6.35 a.m. next morning, 

 provided with a guide for the first part of the way. 



From studying Cotocachi at a distance, it had been settled to 

 make an ascent from the south or south-west. When sweeping 

 the horizon on the top of the Pointe Jarrin, I found that it was 

 much the most elevated and the only snow-clad mountain in the 

 north of Ecuador, and had determined that the more southern of 

 its two peaks was the loftier. The Chief of the Staff, on the 

 contrary, maintained that the northern was the higher point. I 

 overruled him, for on the cross-wire of the theodolite, when we 

 were nearly on a level with the top of Cotocachi, there was a 

 marked, though small, difference between the two peaks in favour 

 of the southern one. 



Our guide led westwards, through lanes whose banks and 

 hedges were laden with ferns ^ (all different from those which had 

 been met with before), and adhered to this course for about six 

 miles, skirting the base of the mountain and apparently taking us 

 away from the goal ; moving parallel to an impassable quebrada, 

 generally about seventy feet wide (which had been formed in 

 1868), until he came to a place where the walls had fallen in and 

 choked the cleft. We crossed this natural bridge, and then steered 

 north-north-west to Iltaqui (10,049 feet) — a very diminutive 

 hacienda and the highest house upon the mountain — which was in 

 charge of one old Indian. 



1 Asplenium trichomaties, L. (abundant) ; Cheilanthes myriojjhyUa, Desv. 

 (abundant); Cystopteris fragilis, Bernh.; Notliolcena sinuata^ Kaulf.; Woodsia 

 mollis, J, Smith ; and others. 



