PERU. 



259 



hail and snow, that proved very uncomfortable to their sunburnt faces: 

 this was supposed to be at an elevation of about fifteen thousand feet. 

 Our gentlemen now felt the effects of the elevation in headache, diffi- 

 culty of breathing, and excessive lassitude. The crest of the Cordilleras 

 is at this place a league in width, the surface very uneven, containing 

 small lakes without outlets sunk in deep hollows ; beyond this, the 

 streams which form the extreme sources of the Amazon were running 

 to the eastward. After travelling two leagues on a gentle descent, 

 they arrived at Casa Cancha about dusk. 



Those .of the party who first arrived witnessed a fracas with the 

 cuchillo, so often appealed to here when a misunderstanding occurs; 

 no injury, however, resulted from it. 



Casa Cancha consists of three huts, and is nothing more than a 

 muleteers' rendezvous ; the place was in charge of two women, who in 

 expression, if not in form, might have been taken for witches. The 

 accommodations, if they may be so called, were an apartment common 

 to all the inmates, with no fastening to the door or windows, without a 

 fire, and nothing but the hard ground to lie upon. 



,.:.'. 



At night, the thermometer frequently falls to the freezing-point, and 

 the climate is like that of winter ; there is not, however, a stick of wood 

 nor any resinous Umbelliferse, as on the Chilian Andes, to be had, and 



