Notes of a naturalist in South America. Ball John
that we passed five times, always at a different level, above the same point in the valley below.
Among the more remarkable works on the line are the viaducts by which deep and broad ravines cut in the friable volcanic rocks have been spanned. The iron beams and girders that sustain these structures appear much slighter than I have seen used in Europe. In crossing one barranca, on what is said to be the loftiest viaduct in the world, I stood on the platform at the end of the car: there being no continuous roadway, the eye plunged directly down into the chasm below, over which we seemed to be travelling on a spider’s web.
For a distance of about eight miles from San Bartolomé the railway keeps near to the bottom of the valley, between slopes whereon a distinct green hue is now visible, and some trickling rivulets are perceived in the channels of the ravines. On the opposite, or northern, slope are still distinctly seen the terraces by which in ancient days the industrious Indian population carried cultivation up the precipitous slopes to a height of more than fifteen hundred feet above the bed of the valley. For in this land, before the Spaniard destroyed its simple civilization and reduced the larger part to a wilderness, the pressure of population was felt as it now is in the southern valleys of the Alps. The fact that terrace cultivation commenced precisely in the part of the valley where we now find streamlets from the flanks of the high mountains above, which might be used for partial irrigation, tends to show that no considerable change of climate has occurred.
ANCIENT INDIAN TERRACES.
Before reaching the Surco station (forty-eight miles from Lima, and 6655 feet above the sea) the road finally abandons the Rimac, and commences the seemingly formidable ascent of the declivity above the left bank. For some distance a projecting buttress with a moderate slope enabled the engineers to accomplish the ascent by long winding curves; but before long we reached the first zigzags, which are frequently repeated during the remainder of the ascent. The tunnels are frequent, but fortunately for the most part short, as the rate of travelling is necessarily slow, and the artificial fuel used gives out black fumes of a stifling character. A further change of climate, welcome to the botanist, was now very obvious. Although the soil appears to be parched, it is clear that some slight rain must recur at moderate intervals. Vegetation, if not luxuriant, finds the needful conditions, and in the gardens of Surco tropical fruits, such as bananas, cherimolias, oranges, and granadillas, are cultivated with tolerable success. Of the indigenous plants in flower at this season the large majority were Compositæ, chiefly belonging to the sun-flower tribe (Helianthoïdeæ), a group characteristic of the New World.7 It was tantalizing to see so many new forms of vegetation pass before one’s eyes untouched. Most of them were indeed finally captured, but several yet remain as fleeting images in my memory, never fixed by closer observation.
About one p.m. we reached the chief village of the valley, San Juan de Matucana, fifty-five miles from Lima, and about 7800 feet above the sea. The train halted here for twenty minutes, and we discovered that very tolerable food is to be had at a little inn kept by an Italian. Hunger having been already stilled, the time was available for botanizing in the neighbourhood of the station, and, along with several cosmopolite weeds which we are used to call European, I found a good many types not before seen. Owing to the accident of having left my gloves in the carriage, I unwisely postponed to collect one plant not seen by me again during my stay in Peru. This was a small species of Tupa, a genus now united to Lobelia, with flowers of a lurid purple colour, which is said to have the singular effect of producing temporary blindness in those who handle the foliage, and I had been assured by Mr. Nation that he had verified the statement by experiment.8 We were here in the intermediate zone, wherein many species of the subtropical region are mingled with those characteristic of the Andean flora. Hitherto the most prevalent families, after the Compositæ, had been the Solanaceæ and Malvaceæ. These have many representatives in the Andean flora, but henceforward were associated with an increasing proportion of types of many different orders.
ASCENT FROM MATUCANA.
As we continued the ascent in the afternoon our locomotive began to show itself unequal to the heavy work of the long-continued ascent, whether owing to defects in construction or, as seemed more probable, to the bad quality of the fuel supplied. Two stoppages occurred, required, as we learned, to clear out tubes. A considerable ascent was then achieved by a detour into a lateral valley above Matucana, returning to the Rimac at a much higher level, as is done on the Brenner line between Gossensass and Schelleberg.
Up to this time the scenery had fallen much below my anticipations. Owing to the nature of the rocks, there was an utter deficiency in that variety of colour and form that are essential elements in the beauty of mountain scenery. A still greater defect is the entire absence of forest. Along the course of the Rimac bushes or small trees, such as Schinus molle, two Acacias, Salix Humboldtiana, and others, are tolerably frequent; but on the rugged surface of the mountain slopes nothing met the eye more conspicuous than the columnar stem of a cactus, or dense rigid tufts of what I took to be a Bromeliaceous plant, most probably a species of Puya. The sun had set, and darkness was fast closing round us when the train came suddenly to a standstill, and the intelligent American guard informed us that a delay of at least twenty minutes was required to set the locomotive in working order.
The accident was in every way fortunate. We had just reached the Puente Infernillo, by far the most striking scene on the whole route, rendered doubly impressive when seen by the rapidly fading light. The railway had here returned to the Rimac, and is carried for a short distance along the right bank. In front the river rushes out of a narrow cleft, while on either hand the mountains rise to a prodigious height, with a steeper declivity than we had as yet anywhere seen. With a lively recollection of the Via Mala, the gorge of Pfeffers, and other scenes of a similar character, I could bring to mind none to rival this for stern sublimity. The impassable chasm that seemed to defy further advance, the roar of the river in the deeply cut channel below, the impending masses that towered up above us, leaving but a strip of sky in view, combined to form such a representation of the jaws of hell as would have satisfied the imagination of the Tuscan poet. To a botanist the scene awoke very different associations. Before it became quite dark I had captured several outposts of the Andean flora, not hitherto seen. The beautiful Tropæolum tuberosum, with masses of flowers smaller, but even more brilliant, than those of the common garden species, climbed over the bushes. A fleshy-leaved Oxalis, the first seen of a numerous group, came out of the crevices of the adjoining rocks, and Alonsoa acutifolia, which I had never seen but in an English greenhouse, was an additional prize.
ASCENT FROM PUENTE INFERNILLO.
Night had completely fallen as we resumed our journey, and although my curiosity was much excited in the attempt to follow the course of the line, I utterly failed to do so. Watching the stars as guides to our direction, where these were not cut off by the frequent tunnels, I could only infer that we were constantly winding round sharp curves, at times near the bottom of a deep ravine, with the roar of a torrent close at hand, and soon after working at a dizzy height along the verge of a precipice, with the muffled bass of a waterfall heard from out of the depths. Even after I had travelled the reverse way in broad daylight, I remained in some doubt as to the real structure of this part of the line. So far as I know, the first application of a spiral tunnel in railway construction was on the line across the Apennine between Bologna and Florence, but the spiral is there but a semicircle; you enter it facing north, and emerge in the opposite direction at a higher level. A similar device has been more freely resorted to in the construction of the St. Gothard line; but on this part of the Oroya line, completed before that of the St. Gothard was commenced, the spiral, if I mistake not, includes two complete circles, at the end of which the train stands nearly vertically above the point from which it started. It is by no means altogether a tunnel, as the form of a great projecting buttress has allowed the line to be carried in great part along a spiral line traced upon its flanks.
Nearly two hours after sunset we at length reached the terminus at Chicla, very uncertain as to the resources of that place in point of shelter and food. We had had the pleasure of meeting in the train Mr. H – , a distinguished German statesman, who had travelled with us in the Islay on his way from California to make the
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