The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-07-25
PIJN0
ON THE SHORE OF LAKE TIFI-
 CACA.
s'HIgh Living" fin Altitude OnIy-The
 Markets of Puno.
Especial Correspondence of the Journal
 and Courier.)

Especial Correspondence of the Journal
 and Courier)
 Puno, Peru, June 20.
 This easternmost town of Peru is not an attractive place. lying, as it does, nearly thirteen thousand feet above the level Of the sea, with no vegetation in its vicinity, storm-swept Lake Titicaca on one side and encompassed on the others by irregular ridges of barren mountains. Yet there is fascination about Puno which incIines the traveller to finger here, however uncomfortable he may be, and impresses every detail of the surroundings indtIbly upon his memory, though many more beautiful scenes are forgotten. It is essentially an Indian town, fully nine-tenths of its population (about five thousand all told), being Aymaras and Quichuas. The formertribe is most numerous. but both are well-to-do, after a comfortless fashion of their own. Each head of a family owns his own house and all have enough to eat-such as it is. At any rate there are no beggars in Puno, though many Peruvian cities that are apparently much richer fairly swarm with them.
 Though so little can be raised in this barren region-wheat not at all, corn never .ripening, and bitter potatoes growing no bigger than the end of your thumb the great lake is an exhaustless store-house, furnishing plenty of fish and always covered with wild fowl of many species. Biscatches (rabbits) abound in the neighboring hills, and vicunas-one of the sacred sheep" of the Andes, whose fur is very valuable are sometimes found. A good many sheep are raised in the vicinity, but the Indians eat mutton only after it has been frozen and dried.
 Peas, beans, peppers and other sta- ples of Peruvian life are all brought up from the coast, as they cannot be cul- tiyated at this chilly altitude. They cannot even be cooked tender at such an elevation until they have first been dried, like the potato, and reduced to powder. Such a thing as an egg hard boiled" cannot possibly be had here. Flour has fallen a good deal in price since the railway now brings it over the mountains. but it is still much too dear to be used by the lower classes
 Though the nights are always cold, the thermometer descending from fif- teen to twenty degrees after sunset, and frequently touching the freezing point even at the height of the season they n1is-calI summer-there is not a house in the town which contains any arrangement for making a fire beyond the adobe ranges for cooking purposes. A South American range, by the way, is merely a mound or chelf of sum dried mud, extending across one side of the kitchen, with small holes scooped out at intervals along it's aip, in which the Puno housewife burns llama dung, or sometimes the twigs of a mountain shrub called tola. :.. ...# The houses, with their enormously thick walls and few windows, have an inner atmosphere damp and cold as that of vault in a cemetery. When the sun shines the people wisely stay out of doors; then, in order to keep warm, they go to bed very early and arise late in the morning. The early bird does no business whatever here abouts. Among the Wea1thier one tenth of the community there are many pleasant people, mainly the families of English and German merchants and American employees of the railroad and steamship lines Most of their homes, however unprepossessing outside, are large and commodious, and contain un- expected luxuries. For instance, pianos are universal in the better houses, though these instruments cost ten times as much here as in the United States, having to be imported from the other side of the world, and until re- gently having tobe brought up from the sea coast on mule-back. I have been astonished more than once on entering what appeared to be a poor mud hovel, destitute of the conmonest comforts, with earth floor, straw roof and wooden shutters in lieu of glass windows, to < find inside both a piano and sewing machine. .I.... IT,.
 At this altitude the dry, thin air is as hard on furniture as on human beings, causing wood to crack and cudl up as quickly as 1t shrivels the skin and wrinkles the face like dried fig, mak- ing a girl of twenty look as old asher great grandmother ought to- Bureaus, tables, &c., are bound to split very soon; chairs lose their rungs and fall apart in no time; drawers cease to fit and floors and ceiled walls shrink wide apart, leaving unsightly crevices. Bill Hard balls have to be kept in oil when not in use, and bar of polished iron may lie out of poors indefinitely with out danger of rusting. The washer woman does not bother herself with clothes lines, nor does she spread the wet linen out on the ground; she mere 1y wrings the; things and losses them down in 3 head, where they quickly @ dry. e
 The patios and courtyards of the bet ter classes are paved in elaborate pat terms with small black and white stones brought from the Titicaca islands; as, for example, a wide circle of jet-black stones surrounds a large, many-rayed central star made of snowy white ones, the outer edge of the black circle bor- dered by running vine, with leaves and flowers made of white pebbles set into the black ofles. The effect is as striking as it is uncommon, and the work is durable enough to outlast a century.
 Before the last war with Chile there was famous college in Puno, where many eminent Peruvians and Bolivians were educated. It is defunct now that