Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-11-22

| leading into numerous smaller apartments,
and very high doorways, whose lintels are
of willow beams. There is one enormous
room, perfectly square, which has two
doorways on its south side, leading by mar
| row halls into q lot of little chambers.
Square apertures, for the beams that once
supported root, are distinctly visible
high up in the lofty walls.
On the other side of the dividing ridge
are the remains OF a palace or temple and
other vast structures, whose ancient use
can only be coniectured, all Of which were
probably among the first which the lneas
erected on the Pacific coast. Though
built of adobes, huge bricks lying scattered
all around in widest confusion, their gen.
eral resemblance to the architecture OF
Cuzco. Limatambo and other lncarial
st-ongholds, proves their identity beyond
doubt. Environed on every hand by
the desert with lofty cliffs between it and
the sea, the nearest habitable place from
Heryey is the sugar estate of Laran,
wherein, luckily, the traveller is always
sure of a welcome From the hospitable
gates of this hacienda an old Inca road
runs to the foot of the cordillera, which is
said to be in precisely the same latitude
with the temple of the Sun at Cuzco
Soon after the conquest this highway was
made the boundary line between New
CASTLE" and "New Toledo" the tributaries
granted to these rascals, Pizarro and AL
magro. 1t was at Laran that the latter
established his quarters in 1887, when,
having returned from his career of crime
in Chile, he proceeded to the coast to claim
from Pizarro his share of Peruy ian terri
tory. The stormy interview that took
place between those two INSCRIPTIONS adj
venturers led to the retreat of Marshal
Almagro into the interior, and his final
overthrow in the bloody battle of Las Sa-
linas
The next village, across long strip of
desert, is Chilea, a collection Of cane huts
surrounding fine old church, in no way
remarkable, except for being inhabited by
race of Indians, who, in this isolated
oasis of the wilderness, have managed to
resist oppression from every source, and to
preserve intact the spirit of their ances-
tors. An example OF their character is
related by recent explorer. His soldier
escort was so unwise as to get into
wrangle with the Syndic of the village,
in course of which the latter barefooted
dignitary received a blow in the head from
the butt end of the soldiers pistol. In
stantly the whole population were wild
with excitement Assembling in the
plaza they demanded that the fellow
should be remanded at once to Lima for
trial nor would they permit him to re-
main over night in the town, but sent him
off into the desert, weary as he was after
hard days journey.
q IL T. r. L.
rights and so suspicious of all outsiders,
that until within a few years there was
one particular room in the Jefe's house,
which was kept on purpose for the accom-
mediation of white travellers. All who
came were put into it and well guarded,
were the party large or small. The Jefe
supplied them with food, but Immediately
informed them that on no account, what
ever their business, would they be allowed
to remain in the village more than twenty
| four hours. The Chilca Indians are an
industrious community, many of them
being employed as farm hands in the
neighboring valley of Mala, others work
ing on their own account as muleteers and
fishermen, while the women braid colored
straws into pretty baskets and cigar cases.
There is widespread tradition among
all the coast Indians that ages before the
appearance of Nance Capac, the country
was inhabited by race of giants, who
came from over the western ocean in great
canoes of blown.up skins. Landing first
near Guayaquil, Ecuador, they gradually
over-spread the country; and to this day
the fossil bones of mammoths and masto-
dons, which are often found imbedded in
the hard clay, are pointed out as proof
of the existence Of those mythical person
ages.
Such are the general characteristics of
that portion of Peru between the cordil-
leras and the sea, with its perpetual alter
nations of dreary desert and fertile valleys.
The length of the shore line, not following
the innumerable bays and lamentations,
but reckoned as the crow flies, from Rio
Tambez, which separates the Republic
from that of Ecuador, to the Rio Loa,
which marked its southern boundary until
Chile lately took off small piece, is lit
down from Panama, the wooded shores of
Ecuador no sooner disappear than the as
pect of the continent is entirely changed.
High, bare, rocks, frayed and crumbling,
line the beach and beyond stretches
a wilderness of sand, beside which Sahara
would be a blooming garden. 1t is the
very dominion of desolation, strewn with
bleaching skeletons left by the old-time
whalers and the bones of mules and horses
that starved to death by the wayside, its
eternal silence broken only by the short,
quick bark of sea lions and the screams of
water fowl
For the most part the sand is hard,
swept smooth by the winds; but in many
places it has drifted up into mounds,
called medanos. Each heap is crescent
shaped, with the bow of the crescent
toward the wind, as regular and sharp IN
outline as the new moon. Whenever these
medanos happen to have a core of rock
they are permanent but most of them
vary in shape with the varying winds.
Brave men, as we'll as bold, must those old
conquistadores have been, when, knowing
nothing of the then UNEMPLOYED better
country beyond the mountains, they sailed
slowly along the borders of this Valley of
Death, against prevailing winds and the
great Antarctic current. Surely nothing
but consuming avarice and an unquench-
able love of adventure could have led
them on.
The largest of the deserts is that called
Sechura, near Payti, in northern Peru
and it is reported that during cloudless
nights the sound of sweet music is heard,
mysteriously waited across the sands. The
climate where rain never falls is not so
oppressive as might be inferred, because
every night refreshing dews descend in
abundance. In ancient times the beauti-
full valleys were even more densely popu-
lated than now, by men who exhausted
the utmost capabilities of every oasis, and
even extended their cities out into the