THE GREAT CORDILLERA. 



185 



On crossing the bridge, which is at the entrance 

 of the town, the market was underneath me, on 

 some low ground on the left. A number of people 

 were selling fruit, vegetables, fish, &c., which 

 were lying on the ground, and as the sun was now 

 oppressively hot, each parcel was shaded by a 

 small canvass blind, which was fixed perpendicu- 

 larly into the ground. 



As I rode along the streets I thought they looked 

 very mean and dirty. Most of the houses had been 

 cracked by earthquakes ; the spires, crosses, and 

 weathercocks, upon the tops of the churches and 

 convents were tottering, and out of the perpendi- 

 cular ; and the very names of the streets, and the 

 stories Aqui se vende. Sec.,"*' which are over all 

 the shops, were written as crooked and irregular as 

 if they had been inscribed during an earthquake. 

 They were generally begun with large letters, but 

 the man had apparently got so eager about the 

 subject, that he was often obliged to conclude in 

 characters so small, that one could hardly read 

 them, and in some places the author had 

 thoughtlessly arrived at the end of his board before 

 he had come to the end of his story. 



