26 THE ANDES OF SOUTHERN PERU 



less border character or a downright criminal, no system of gov- 

 ernment would be adequate, least of all one like peonage that per- 

 mits or ignores flagrant wrongs because it is so expensive to en- 

 force justice. 



The peonage system continues by reason of that extraordinary 

 difficulty in the development of the tropical lowland of South 

 America — the lack of a labor supply. The population of Amazonia 

 now numbers less than one person to the square mile. The people 

 are distributed in small groups of a dozen to twenty each in scat- 

 tered villages along the river banks or in concealed clearings 

 reached by trails known only to the Indians. Nearly all of them 

 still live in the same primitive state in which they lived at the 

 time of the Discovery. In the Urubamba region a single cotton 

 shirt is worn by the married men and women, while the girls 

 and boys in many cases go entirely naked except for a loincloth 

 or a necklace of nuts or monkeys' teeth (Fig. 23). A cane hut 

 with a thatch to keep out the heavy rains is their shelter and their 

 food is the yuca, sugar cane, Indian corn, bananas of many kinds, 

 and fish. A patch of yuca once planted will need but the most 

 trifling attention for years. The small spider monkey is their 

 greatest delicacy and to procure it they will often abandon every 

 other project and return at their own sweet and belated will. 



In the midst of this natural life of the forest-dwelling Indian 

 appears the rubber man, who, to gather rubber, must have rubber 

 "pickers." If he lives on the edge of the great Andean Cordil- 

 lera, laborers may be secured from some of the lower valleys, but 

 they must be paid well for even a temporary stay in the hot and 

 unhealthful lowlands. Farther out in the great forest country the 

 plateau Indians will not go and only the scattered tribes remain 

 from which to recruit laborers. For the nature-life of the Indian 

 what has the rubber gatherer to offer? Money? The Indian uses 

 it for ornament only. When I once tried with money to pay an 

 Indian for a week's services he refused it. In exchange for his 

 severe labor he wanted nothing more than a fish-hook and a ring, 

 the two costing not more than a penny apiece ! When his love for 

 ornament has once been gratified the Indian ceases to work. His 



