472 



APPENDIX. 



a populous Indian town having the same name. Its agreeable site, and the fine 

 temperature of the air, call loudly for its re-constru£tion ; at the same time that 

 the productiveness and fertility of these low grounds, in which the quina trees, 

 those more especially that yield the yellow bark, flourish, render them well adapted 

 to the cultivation of indigo, of fine tobacco similar to that produced at the Ha- 

 vannah, of cochineal which 'is collected throughout the year ; of rice, and, in ge- 

 neral, of all esculent plants, as is indicated by those that, growing wild, were for- 

 merly sought after witla great avidity, and by those that still spring up. Here it is 

 that Don Juan de Bezares has already cleared the ground for a new settlement, to 

 be denominated San Carlos. At the distance of somewhat more than half a league 

 lies the river Yanamayo, beyond which, at a similar distance, the traveller has to 

 cross the bridge thrown by Bezares over the stream Xincartambo. Here com- 

 mence the great pajonales (the parts covered by high grasses) of the mountainous 

 territory, capable, through their extent, of nourishing many thousand heads of 

 cattle of every description. Proceeding onward half a league, the bridge of Chin- 

 chima, over the river Monzon, terminates the eleven leagues of the new road 

 opened by Bezares, the plantations and high grasses still presenting themselves to 

 the view. 



From this site the traveller proceeds by the bank of the river Monzon, and at 

 the end of the second league reaches the village of Chipaco, in which there are 

 twenty-six heads of families, partly mestizos, and partly tributary Indians, who 

 are, as well as the other settlers on this bank, visited but once a year by the sub- 

 reftor, and the coUeftor of the sub-delegate of the province. Considering the fer- 

 tility of the extensive marshes they inhabit, and which are adapted, on either 

 bank, to every description of cultivation, as well as to the rearing of qattle, they 

 may be said to be poor and needy. Their idle prejudices formerly deprived them 

 of the best part of their sustenance, namely, the broad beans and Yucas : the 

 former, in their persuasion, gave them the itch, and the latter dried the blood. 

 Bezares has, however, succeeded in subduing these prejudices, and, in addition to 

 the above, has introduced various produftions, particularly the anil, which for 

 that purpose he caused to be brought from Nicaragua. 



At the distance of half a league from the village of Chipaco lies the river Au- 

 cantagua, which rises in the south, and runs through an extensive and fertile 

 marsh communicating with the high grounds. Several towns, inhabited by 

 civilized Indians, formerly subsisted in this district. The vestiges of the capital, 

 named Chancaran, are still discernible ; and about them are to be seen the ruins of 

 the works erected for the purifying of the gold and silver ores brought from the 



mines 



