Identifier: acrosssouthamer00bing (find matches)
Title: Across South America; an account of a journey from Buenos Aires to Lima by way of Potosí, with notes on Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and Peru
Year: 1911 (1910s)
Authors: Bingham, Hiram, 1875-1956
Subjects: South America -- Description and travel
Publisher: Boston, New York : Houghton Mifflin Company
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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rom Potosi in 1828, that I shallquote in full his quaint and vivid description. Aftertravelling twelve, thirteen, and, as I imagined, everymile of the distance from Ventilla to La Paz, my as-tonishment was excited by not perceiving on so levela plain any object indicating the existence of a town.Sundry groups of Indians, droves of mules, llamas,and asses, some unladen, some with burdens, wereindeed to be seen passing and repassing, as in thebustle of business, but no buildings or habitationwhatever; no turret, dome, or steeple of church orconvent appeared in view, although the tolling oftheir bells occasionally struck faintly on the ear. Huge,barren, weather-beaten rocks, and snow-coveredmountains, apparently close at hand, rose directlybefore me, and presented an impassable barrier. I could not perceive where I was to find a town;and, as I rode onwards In strange perplexity, endeav-oring to solve the enigma, I arrived suddenly at theverge of an abrupt and prodigious precipice, at the
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MONOLITHIC IMAGE AT TIAHUANACO LA PAZ 229 bottom of which I beheld, in diminutive perspective,the large and populous city of La Paz. . . . Throughthis fairy town may be faintly seen, winding withoccasional interruptions, a silver thread markedwith specks of frothy white, which, upon approach-ing, proves to be a mountain-torrent, leaping fromrock to rock, and sweeping through the valley. Incasting a glance farther round, you perceive squaresand patches of every shade of green and yellow,which, to a European, is perhaps the most strikingpart of the interesting scene. Corn, and fruit, andvegetables, and crops of every kind, may be seen inall their stages, from the act of sowing to that ofgathering them in; here, a field of barley luxuriantlygreen; there, another in full maturity, which the In-dians are busily reaping; next to it, a crop just ap-pearing above the ground. Farther on, another ar-rived at half its growth; beyond it, a man guiding apair of oxen yoked to a shapeless stick, the

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