272 ^ CENTRAL CHILE chap. 



little coves and bays ; and here and there a solitary hillock 

 peeping up showed that it had formerly stood there as an 

 islet. The contrast of these flat valleys and basins with the 

 irregular mountains gave the scenery a character which to me 

 was new and very interesting. 



From the natural slope to seaward of these plains, they 

 are very easily irrigated, and in consequence singularly fertile. 

 Without this process the land would produce scarcely anything, 

 for during the whole summer the sky is cloudless. The 

 mountains and hills are dotted over with bushes and low trees, 

 and excepting these the vegetation is very scanty. Each 

 landowner in the valley possesses a certain portion of hill- 

 country, where his half-wild cattle, in considerable numbers, 

 manage to find sufficient pasture. Once every year there is a 

 grand " rodeo," when all the cattle are driven down, counted, 

 and marked, and a certain number separated to be fattened in 

 the irrigated fields. Wheat is extensively cultivated, and a 

 good deal of Indian corn : a kind of bean is, however, the 

 staple article of food for the common labourers. The orchards 

 produce an overflowing abundance of peaches, figs, and grapes. 

 With all these advantages the inhabitants of the country ought 

 to be much more prosperous than they are. 



\C)th. — The mayor-domo of the Hacienda was good enough 

 to give me a guide and fresh horses ; and in the morning we 

 set out to ascend the Campana, or Bell Mountain, which is 

 6400 feet high. The paths were very bad, but both the geology 

 and scenery amply repaid the trouble. We reached, by the 

 evening, a spring called the Agua del Guanaco, which is 

 situated at a great height. This must be an old name, for it 

 is very many years since a guanaco drank its waters. During 

 the ascent I noticed that nothing but bushes grew on the 

 northern slope, whilst on the southern slope there was a bamboo 

 about fifteen feet high. In a few places there were palms, and 

 I was surprised to see one at an elevation of at least 4500 

 feet. These palms are, for their family, ugly trees. Their 

 stem is very large, and of a curious form, being thicker in the 

 middle than at the base or top. They are excessively numerous 

 in some parts of Chile, and valuable on account of a sort of 

 treacle made from the sap. On one estate near Petorca they 

 tried to count them, but failed, after having numbered several 



