PERU'S WEALTH-PRODUCING BIRDS 



541 



THF AIR AS WELL AS THE CUFF-TOP IS ALIVE WITH GUANAYS 



When walking, these birds suggest penguins, with their erect, waddling gait; in flight, they 

 form long, black clouds, miles in length. 



ern American agriculture, there existed 

 on the west coast of South America a 

 civilization of high attainments in agri- 

 culture, in textile industries, and in archi- 

 tecture. 



The ancient Peruvians found their 

 westward land a vast desert in its natural 

 condition, except for a few narrow and 

 fertile valleys traversed by inconstant 

 streams. They might have confined their 

 farming operations to the shores of these 

 natural water-courses, but, as an aggres- 

 sive and intelligent people, they extended 

 their cultivated fields far over the natu- 

 rally arid wastes. 



This they accomplished by developing 

 a science of agricultural engineering 

 marked by extensive irrigation works, 

 with canals and ditches that followed the 

 contours of hillsides, tier after tier, or 

 pierced sharp ridges with remarkable 

 tunnels.* 



* See "The Staircase Farms of the Ancients," 

 by O. F. Cook, in the National Geographic 

 Magazine for May, 1916. 



The great obstacle Nature had placed 

 in the way of their agriculture being 

 overcome, they found upon the coast and 

 islands a unique compensation for their 

 difficulties. The same conditions which 

 made the lands naturally arid had also 

 conserved to them the best of agricultural 

 aids in Peruvian guano. 



They took fertilizer from the islands 

 to enrich the lands, even in the high 

 altitudes of the montaiia, two or three 

 miles above sea-level. Incidentally they 

 left in the kitchen-middens of the camps 

 upon the islands relics of pottery and 

 metal-ware suggestive of an origin of the 

 guano industry dating back at least to 

 an early period in our Christian area. 



These early Americans appreciated the 

 value of the producing birds, and they 

 not only enacted most rigorous edicts 

 for the protection of their feathered 

 benefactors, but, according to the account 

 of the Inca Garcilasso de la Vega, they 

 so administered the industry of guano 

 extraction as to make possible the effect- 



