8o NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
fall, although no one expects the struggle will be 
over in less than six months. [No ! Castilla proved 
too strong for them.] Meantime, an innocent 
traveller, who may be supposed to possess any- 
thing worth robbing, runs the risk of being accused 
as a partisan, either of Vivanco or of Castilla, 
according to the colour of the revolutionary band 
he falls in with ; so that even Peruvians, who have 
anything to lose, put off their journeys to an inde- 
finite date. I had lately a dispute with the present 
Commandant of Tarapoto — a presumptuous, ignorant 
young fellow — -wherein he propounded the doctrine 
''En tiempo de revolucion todos los bienes son 
connmes ! " I told him the intent of such revolu- 
tions was simply indiscriminate plunder. 
On the last day of the carnival (Shrove Tuesday) 
we had an uprising of the Indians, and there was a 
struggle between them and the soldiery in the 
square. Several Indians received bayonet-wounds, 
and one died of his wounds the second day. 
A few days ago a tiger ^ was killed within forty 
paces of my house. I was sitting in the doorway 
at daybreak, sipping my chocolate, when I -heard a 
multitude of people running down the valley and 
uttering the most infernal cries, among which I at 
length distinguished the word ''puma" many times 
repeated. I seized my pistol and ran to the edge 
of the barranco, where I saw the puma coming 
straight for my door ; but he missed the narrow 
track among the canes — the only practicable ascent 
— and got to the foot of the barranco, where it rose 
in a perpendicular wall 30 feet high. There he was 
^ [This term seems to be applied to both the puma and the jaguars — very 
distinct animals. ^ — Ed,] 
