Walter Good fellow—Some Beminiscences of a Collector 345


and generally avoided by travellers locally as its people have a bad

reputation. It is called La Patia, is very hot, possibly unhealthy,

for it is, I believe, rather below sea-level. Why I mention it is because

I saw birds there I had not seen in any of the surrounding districts.

Collectors may have been there but I never heard of any. It is well

watered, and what inhabitants it has are all negroes. That foreigners,

and especially English, can go there and be well treated I proved.

Although in Popayan I had been warned against it by everyone,

I still intended to stay there to collect for a short time if I thought

it looked favourable, so when arranging with muleteers I stipulated

that if I did not like the look of the place I would continue on to Pasto.

The Patia is about half-way, and I had already paid in advance half

the hire of the mules to Pasto according to custom. However, before

I reached the valley I had already decided to go on, for the region seemed

isolated and, having met no mule trains en route, I began to feel if

once set down there it might be a long time before I could get away

again. The end of my journey south was to be Quito, and finally

over the Andes to the headwaters of the Amazon and home via that

river. The season too was getting advanced as I had spent more time

in Popayan and its surrounding mountains than I had intended.


The valley as we approached it from the north was quite suddenly

revealed at our feet, as we had come to the brink of a great precipice

without apparently any way down. There was a way, however, a

very steep and winding one among rocks which concealed it. Once

at the bottom, after fording many rivers or branches of the same one,

we came late in the afternoon to a small village of thatched and white¬

washed huts, but without any inhabitants in sight. Here at once the

muleteers began to unload although I protested and explained that

I would go on, but they complained that my baggage was altogether

too heavy for their animals, so off they went in all haste and I was

left with my belongings in what looked like a deserted village except

for a few pigs and fowls. I knocked at the door of a house that looked

a little better than the others, and after a time a very fat negress

appeared and I explained my position. She inquired who and what

I was and when she found I was not a Colombian she thawed a little.

I must explain that I was dressed in poncho and zamaras (chaps)



