After We Left South America,
He Paid The Penalty In The Usual Manner, By Being Conquered,
Taken Prisoner, And Shot.
Lima stands on a plain in a valley, formed during the
gradual retreat of the sea.
It is seven miles from Callao,
and is elevated 500 feet above it; but from the slope being
very gradual, the road appears absolutely level; so that when
at Lima it is difficult to believe one has ascended even one
hundred feet: Humboldt has remarked on this singularly deceptive
case. Steep barren hills rise like islands from the
plain, which is divided, by straight mud-walls, into large
green fields. In these scarcely a tree grows excepting a few
willows, and an occasional clump of bananas and of oranges.
The city of Lima is now in a wretched state of decay: the
streets are nearly unpaved; and heaps of filth are piled up
in all directions, where the black gallinazos, tame as poultry,
pick up bits of carrion. The houses have generally an upper
story, built on account of the earthquakes, of plastered
woodwork but some of the old ones, which are now used by several
families, are immensely large, and would rival in suites
of apartments the most magnificent in any place. Lima, the
City of the Kings, must formerly have been a splendid town.
The extraordinary number of churches gives it, even at the
present day, a peculiar and striking character, especially
when viewed from a short distance.
One day I went out with some merchants to hunt in the
immediate vicinity of the city.
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