It Is, However, Doubtful How Far This
Idea Will Explain The Circumstances Of Torrents Of Rain Falling
In The Dry Season During Several Days, After An Earthquake
Unaccompanied By An Eruption; Such Cases Seem To
Bespeak Some More Intimate Connection Between The Atmospheric
And Subterranean Regions.
Finding little of interest in this part of the ravine, we
retraced our steps to the house of Don Benito, where I stayed
two days collecting fossil shells and wood.
Great prostrate
silicified trunks of trees, embedded in a conglomerate, were
extraordinarily numerous. I measured one, which was fifteen
feet in circumference: how surprising it is that every
atom of the woody matter in this great cylinder should have
been removed and replaced by silex so perfectly, that each
vessel and pore is preserved! These trees flourished at about
the period of our lower chalk; they all belonged to the fir-
tribe. It was amusing to hear the inhabitants discussing the
nature of the fossil shells which I collected, almost in the
same terms as were used a century ago in Europe, - namely,
whether or not they had been thus "born by nature." My
geological examination of the country generally created a
good deal of surprise amongst the Chilenos: it was long
before they could be convinced that I was not hunting for
mines. This was sometimes troublesome: I found the most
ready way of explaining my employment, was to ask them
how it was that they themselves were not curious concerning
earthquakes and volcanos? - why some springs were hot and
others cold? - why there were mountains in Chile, and not
a hill in La Plata? These bare questions at once satisfied
and silenced the greater number; some, however (like a few
in England who are a century behindhand), thought that all
such inquiries were useless and impious; and that it was
quite sufficient that God had thus made the mountains.
An order had recently been issued that all stray dogs
should be killed, and we saw many lying dead on the road. A
great number had lately gone mad, and several men had been
bitten and had died in consequence. On several occasions
hydrophobia has prevailed in this valley. It is remarkable
thus to find so strange and dreadful a disease, appearing
time after time in the same isolated spot. It has been
remarked that certain villages in England are in like manner
much more subject to this visitation than others. Dr. Unanue
states that hydrophobia was first known in South
America in 1803: this statement is corroborated by Azara
and Ulloa having never heard of it in their time. Dr. Unanue
says that it broke out in Central America, and slowly
travelled southward. It reached Arequipa in 1807; and it is
said that some men there, who had not been bitten, were
affected, as were some negroes, who had eaten a bullock
which had died of hydrophobia. At Ica forty-two people thus
miserably perished. The disease came on between twelve
and ninety days after the bite; and in those cases where it
did come on, death ensued invariably within five days. After
1808, a long interval ensued without any cases. On inquiry,
I did not hear of hydrophobia in Van Diemen's Land, or in
Australia; and Burchell says, that during the five years he
was at the Cape of Good Hope, he never heard of an instance
of it. Webster asserts that at the Azores hydrophobia has
never occurred; and the same assertion has been made with
respect to Mauritius and St. Helena. [2] In so strange a disease
some information might possibly be gained by considering
the circumstances under which it originates in distant climates;
for it is improbable that a dog already bitten, should
have been brought to these distant countries.
At night, a stranger arrived at the house of Don Benito,
and asked permission to sleep there. He said he had been
wandering about the mountains for seventeen days, having
lost his way. He started from Guasco, and being accustomed
to travelling in the Cordillera, did not expect any difficulty
in following the track to Copiapo; but he soon became
involved in a labyrinth of mountains, whence he could not
escape. Some of his mules had fallen over precipices, and he
had been in great distress. His chief difficulty arose from
not knowing where to find water in the lower country, so that
he was obliged to keep bordering the central ranges.
We returned down the valley, and on the 22nd reached
the town of Copiapo. The lower part of the valley is broad,
forming a fine plain like that of Quillota. The town covers
a considerable space of ground, each house possessing a garden:
but it is an uncomfortable place, and the dwellings are
poorly furnished. Every one seems bent on the one object
of making money, and then migrating as quickly as possible.
All the inhabitants are more or less directly concerned with
mines; and mines and ores are the sole subjects of conversation.
Necessaries of all sorts are extremely dear; as the
distance from the town to the port is eighteen leagues, and
the land carriage very expensive. A fowl costs five or six
shillings; meat is nearly as dear as in England; firewood,
or rather sticks, are brought on donkeys from a distance of
two and three days' journey within the Cordillera; and pasturage
for animals is a shilling a day: all this for South
America is wonderfully exorbitant.
June 26th. - I hired a guide and eight mules to take me
into the Cordillera by a different line from my last excursion.
As the country was utterly desert, we took a cargo
and a half of barley mixed with chopped straw. About two
leagues above the town a broad valley called the "Despoblado,"
or uninhabited, branches off from that one by which
we had arrived. Although a valley of the grandest dimensions,
and leading to a pass across the Cordillera, yet it is
completely dry, excepting perhaps for a few days during
some very rainy winter.
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