THE ROAD TO BOLIVIA 271 



g3a'ations are calculated to excite alarm among nervous people who 

 do not know tliat mule-drivers in South America alwaA^s act that wa}'. 

 Beside his long whip, which is handled with great skill and accuracy, 

 he carries a bag full of small stones, and shies them with an aim that 

 David himself could not have excelled. Indeed, he can touch the tip 

 of the ear of the leader of his eight-mule team nine times out of ten 

 with a pebble not larger than a pigeon's egg. The road is covered 

 with boulders that vary in size from a i^aseball to a washtub, round 

 and smooth, and they are strewn from one end of the journey to the 

 other. It seems as if all the boulders in the world had been collected 

 and dropped into the roadway. 



Like the rest of the great plateau that lies between the two ranges 

 of the Andes, the area from Lake Titicaca to La Paz is divided into 

 a few enormous farms, dotted with groups of stone huts that have been 

 occupied for generations, and even centuries, by the ancestors of the 

 tenants who till the ground and herd the sheep and cattle. The rela- 

 tions ])etween the landlord and tenants are similar to those of the old 

 feudal times in Il]urope. The former exercises patriarchal authority 

 over the Indians that live upon his lands, and the}^ serve him with 

 loyalt}' as long as he allo;vs them a measure of independence. The 

 Jiaciendns seldom change hands. The property is inherited by one 

 generation from another, and the customs of the country are so fixed 

 and rigid that they are seldom violated b_v either employer or emplo3^ed. 



The stone huts of the tenants are usually found in little groups or 

 villages, and occasionally among them 3^ou find a little chapel which 

 is attended by a padre, who exercises an influence among his parish- 

 ioners even greater than that of the Juiclcndado. In addition to his 

 spiritual ministrations, the cure is expected to maintain a school for 

 the children of the parish, but in most cases these duties are purely 

 theoretical and the Indians remain untaught. 



As the journey to La Paz approaches its end, the traveler enjoys a 

 startling surprise. The highway across the plateau leads to the brink 

 of a canon 1,100 feet deep, whose walls are almost perpendicular, and 

 which in color and topography resembles the Grand Canon of the 

 Colorado. At the foot of this mighty gorge lies the capital of Bolivia. 

 The first glance shows a vast expanse of red-tiled roofs, occasional!}^ 

 broken by bunches of foliage or graceful spires, and a river tumbling 

 down fnjm the mountains is crossed b}^ picturesque bridges of massive 

 masonry centuries old. 



Rome, you know, sat U[)on seven hills, and if that is an advantage, 



