204 CHILI. 
Our gentlemen returned to the rancho of Evangelisto Celidono, where 
they passed the night, and were furnished with a like casuela as 
before. All the farmers they met were a simple, good-hearted set, 
caring for little beyond their own immediate neighbourhood, and 
knowing little but to supply their own wants. Celidono informed 
them that he had been at the Port (Valparaiso) only once in five years. 
He seems to have all that is needful. His wife was engaged in spin- 
ning with the distaff and spindle. There being but one room, they 
were accommodated on the clay floor, spread with their pillions and 
saddle-cloths, while Celidono and his wife occupied the bed. The tem- 
perature varied from 65-30° on their arrival, at 5 h 30 m , to 53° at 11 p. m. 
On the morning of the 24th, the thermometer stood at 51°, on 
the summit of the cuesta, and at 58° between 9 and 10 o'clock. 
Here the scene was very different from what they had before wit- 
nessed. The plain they had just left was in broad sunshine, showing 
distinctly its many cultivated farms ; that to which they were about 
descending was a sea of dense white clouds, extending seaward as far 
as the eye could reach, as though a vast body of white cumuli had 
descended and filled the whole extent of the Quillota valley. These 
clouds kept rolling off towards the sea before the light wind, and rose 
gradually as they passed off. They reached Mr. Blanchard's, at 
Quillota, at noon, when the temperature was 60°, and taking their 
biloche, they arrived at Valparaiso m the evening. 
Having heard much about the rise of the coast, from the effects of 
earthquakes, I was desirous of gaining all the information in relation 
to this subject. From the residents the accounts are so contradictory, 
that no correct intelligence can be obtained. The decrease in the 
depth of the bay, I have before said, can be accounted for, and un- 
doubtedly is owing, so far as it has taken place, to the wash of the 
hills ; and the formation of a new street which has been reclaimed 
from the bay, has given rise to the idea, and it is pointed out as 
having been built upon ground left dry by the earthquake of 1832. 
Several of our naturalists made a close examination of the coast in the 
neighbourhood, the result of which on the minds of all was, that there 
was no proof of elevation. That changes in the beaches, through the 
agency of the heavy rollers and the northers that yearly occur, are 
constantly going on, is quite evident ; but these, as one would natu- 
rally suppose, increase the shores only in some places, while in others 
they are wearing it away. 
Earthquakes do not appear to happen at any particular season. 
