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CARGUEROS, OR MEN-CARRIERS. 329 
skill of a carguero, and are not strong enough to 
travel on foot, must relinquish all thoughts of leaving 
the country. The number of persons who follow 
this laborious occupation, at Choco, Hague, and 
Medellin, is so great that our travellers sometimes 
met a file of fifty or sixty. Near the mines of Mexico — 
there are also individuals who have no other employ- 
ment than that of carrying men on their backs. 
The cargueros, in crossing the forests of Quindiu, 
take with them bundles of the large oval leaves of the 
vijao, a plant of the banana family, the peculiar 
varnisn of which enables them to resist rain. A 
hundredweight of these leaves is sufficient to cover 
a hut large enough to hold six or eight persons. 
When they come to a convenient spot .where they 
intend to pass the night, the carriers lop a few 
branches from the trees, with which they con- 
struct a frame; it is then divided into squares by 
the stalks of some climbing plant, or threads of agave, 
on which are hung the vijao leaves, by means of a 
eut made in their midrib. In one of these tents, 
which are cool, commodious, and perfectly dry, our 
travellers passed several days in the valley of Bo- 
quia, amidst violent and incessant rains. 
From these mountains, where the truncated cone 
of Tolima, covered with perennial snow, rises amidst 
forests of styrax, arborescent passifloree, bamboos, and 
waxpalms, they descended into the valley of Cauca 
towards the west. After resting some time at Ca- 
thago and Buga, they coasted the province of Choco, 
where platina is found among rolled fragments of 
basalt, greenstone, and fossil wood. 
They then went up by Caloto and the mines of 
Quilichao to Popayan, which is situated at the base 
