384 



THREE YEARS IN THE PACIFIC. 



and various presents, that were placed on the wheel, and re- 

 ceived on the inside by a female with a sweet voice. She 

 heard me speaking, and inquired who the stranger was, and 

 then asked me, whether I was a Christian, and how I liked 

 Peru. I told her, that it was an interesting country, though I 

 thought Truxillo very dull, and I ventured to inquire, whether 

 she did not sometimes feel a want of society. She replied, 

 ^^jamas ! somos veinte, todas esposas de nuestro Senor Jesu 

 Christo, y que otra felicidad podemos desear !" — Never, we 

 are twenty, all wives of our Lord Jesus Christ, and what other 

 happiness can we desire ! She sent me out a scapulary, which 

 she bid me wear as an amulet for the sake of Nuestra Senora 

 del Carmen, and for which 1 returned some silver in charity, 

 and asked how long she had been a nun. Imagination pictured 

 her to be young, and of course beautiful, because she had a 

 sweet voice ; but the romance vanished, when she told me that 

 she had taken the veil more than thirty years back, at the age 

 of seventeen ! 



On the corner of the convent is the chapel, which is open 

 to the public. The interior is tastefully decorated, and almost 

 hidden in gilded mouldings and panels. On the side next the 

 convent, are holes about a foot square, covered with a tin per- 

 forated plate, through which the nuns whisper their confessions 

 to the priests, who occupy the confessionals placed immediate- 

 ly below. 



Leaving Truxillo at midnight, we anchored the next day be^ 

 fore the port of Pacasmayo, situated about fifty miles to the 

 northward. We landed, as at Huanehaco, in a launch. The port 

 consists of a half dozen ranchos, built on the sand, of reeds and 

 flag, without door or window, inhabited by Indians, who are 

 exclusively employed in fishing with their caballitos. They 

 , use small cast nets, by which they obtain almost their only 

 food. In one of the ranchos, an old woman was spinning after 

 a very primitive fashion. She was seated on the ground, h la 

 Turque, with a roll of nicely picked cotton enclosed in paper, 

 and supported on three sticks, forming a kind of tripod. Her 

 dress was a woollen petticoat, and a shawl of coarse blue baize ; 

 her face was wrinkled, and her head gray. The eottan wa«. 



