A RUN AFTER THE ALPACAS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 7, Issue 356, 13 August 1863, Page 4

A RUN AFTER THE ALPACAS

[Communicated to the Argus]

The country of tlie Alpaca is as little known as the animal itself, and a tew words about it will, perhaps, be read with some interest, as the time draws near for the arrival of these animals which are coming direct from their native hills to this colony. At one time the land of the alpaca was well watered and cultivated. Then there were no horses or asses, cattle or sheep, or dogs, or pigs, or 'poultry, l’he llama and alpaca, the guanac-o and vicuna, were the principal animals of the ancient Peruvians. The first was their beast of burden, the second sup]died food and clothing, and the two last sports for the Royal families of Cuzco, and the finest of wools for the service of Pachacamac and the virgins of the Temple of the sun. It is reckoned that the population of the whole empire, extending from beyond the equator to Arouco, and embracing the Gran Chaco in the east, and the mighty Savannahs of the west, inhabited by the Moxos and Guaranies, amounted to more than 20,000,000. The above animals then ranged through its vast extent, and were cultivated under every possible variety of climate. Indeed, they were the only animals which supplied the necessaries of life to a people scattered along the coast, through the valleys,’and everywhere over the mountains' of Peru. Then the Spaniards came, and for some time these creatures were their only'beasts of burden. The gold with which Atahualpa promised Pizarro to fill a room for j his ransom was carried on the backs of 11,000 llamas. It poured in from all parts; and if the impatient conquistador had been strong enough to wait, Atahualpa would have kept his promise ; but the llamas travelled slowly and came from afar*. When the Spaniards began to breed horses and mules, cattjj? and sheep, the llamas and alpacas were neglected ; and as the Indian withdrew to the fastnesses of the Andes to escape from the bondage of Spain his animals followed him thither and have remained there almost ever since. Man and beast have degenerated ; and it is a fact easily ascertaind that iu less than tw r o centuries after the conquest of Peru there were more ‘ wild Indians ’ than in the time of Inca lupangui, who instituted the order of Mitimars. During those two centuries more than 8,000,000 men perished in the silver mines of Potosi ; how many metre in the obrages and plantations will never be known. Suffice it to say that, throughout Upper Peru more particularly, there are hundreds of once flourishing towns with twenty times more houses than inhabitants and every town, with the single exception of the ancient Charcas, is a ghastly heap of ruins. The city of Potosi alone numbered in its silver days, 200,000 persons living in houses. It does not now number 10,000, and it is reckoned that the entire population has dwindled down from 20,000,000 to less than 6,000,000. The deserted towns and villages of Peru are more numerous than the gravestones ofa city churchyard. The only one of the four wooly quadrupeds which once occupied the whole surface of the land which now wanders over it unrestricted by cold, or heat, or swamp, or sand, is the guanaco. The cultivation of them in Australia will, I believe, issue in a renovation of their nature. The alpaca will renew its strength under genial skies and amj.*le food. Eight bundl ed miles across tlie desert of Atacama brought me to the region of our alpaca flocks. I am not about to des-

ci*ibe the journey. Only they who have roughed it in countries where no European language is spoken, where the cookery is hateful, and the people treacherous and brutally ignorant —where there are no roads, no knives and forks, no clean sheets, nor clean straw, —only they could believe what a man may write who lias passed much of his time in the provinces of Lipes, Potosi, and Oruro. Through those weary days I was 'attended by one Indian ; aud I passed through two in habited villages in a distance that took me eighteen days to traverse. I breathed an atmosphere of sand and vermin the whole way, seasoned with the carcases of dead mules, condors and tobacco. But for the tobacco I believed I should have sickened and died. The sleeping places are at almost regular distances of forty miles and ai’e called tambos and postas The tambo is a place were you can buy fodder at the rate of about £2O a ton, and sometimes fresh eggs at Is a piece. The posta is a mere turf hut, where the Indian postman lives, with his wife and children, pigs, and dogs, and where also may be seen and felt one or two of tlie plagues of Egypt. The filth in which these wretches live is not fit to be told. They never wash themselves or their clothes. The color of their skins is that of a dirty copper kettle. Their only food is chutio or frozen potatoes, as big as little marbles, charqui of llama, aud guinea-jugs the size of rats. The only personal attention they bestow on themselves is indressing their hair, which they never cut’ but plait in long thick trensas. The single men wear it in one long tail, -twisted like a turban round their heads.. Married men wear two tails, hanging down their backs like women. The children and young girls are pretty, but filth and detestable cookery soon make them ugly enough. One bed is occupied in common by tlie whole family, none of whom ever undress. Though living in so much

squalor aud misery,' many are rich in hoarded wealth. Some travellers infer from tliis that Indiada is preparing to re-con-quer its native land, and restore the dynasty of Manco Capac. Tlie Indian Luries his money as the monkey or magpie steals the spoons and hides them, and has abo :t as much thought of rebuilding Cuzco as , the Moors of re-conquering Spain, and one would be as possible as the other. There is no difference between the Indians of the desert and those who live in the mountains. But it is a relief to leave the blistering sun and sand of the one and get into the howling winds and snow storms of the other. It is the change from death to rude life. I was astonished to see mountain waffs made the home of richly feathered parrots. I thought parrots lived in woods. I found sugar-cane ripen at a height of nearly seven thousand feet above the sea-line ; cocoa at something more than five thou sand, and lucerne at eleven thonsaud feet; ocas (oxalis tuberosa ) and ullucas, and also maize, hut the heads were small. Barley I have seen grow at the height of nearly thirteen thousand feet; but it does not ripen, and is ouly used as fodder. In these regions there are no trees for firewood, nor peat, and tlie only fuel that can he got consists of the dried dung of llamas and alpacas. Miners iu the process of smelting, prefer it to coal ; it produces a brisk and intense heat. In these regions green grass is seldom or never seen and the vast levels, or * punas ’ as we have to call them, are only thinly coated with faded herbage, looking as if it was trying to live on prussic acid. What these punas are, their climate and inhabitants, I shall attempt to describe, for they are the pre sent abode of the great mammalia indigenous to Peru—the llama and alpaca, and their co-genera, the vicuna and guanaco. The height above the level of the sea of these punas varies between 7000 and 13,000 feet. There, for four or five months, a howling tempest sweeps unresisted over the plain. Rain falls not in drops, but torrents, and invariably from about two o’clock till five in the afternoon. It is accompanied with such thunder and lightning as make all nature —man, and beast, and mountain—crouch andbend. For the rest of the year no rain ever falls, no lightning storm disturbs a cloud, and the heat of the sun rages unrestrained.. The nights are cold, but the variation of the thermometer is not more than from five to seven degrees. The great condor is the tyrant of these mountain deserts. He is a wild beast with wings, and will attack a man if he falls, asleej) on the ground ; he carries off the young of the vicunas and llamas. He measures about five feet from bead to tail and thirteen or fourteen feet from the tip of one wing to the other, small birds, of course, are scarce, but there is one called the ingliahnallpa, or cock of the Inca, wliich’utters a regular hourly note through the night. Another, called the huacliua is a species of goose, having a dazzlingly white waistcoat, with green wings shading into brilliant violet, the feet and beak being quite red. This, together with the licli (a plover), one or two species of ibis, white mews, and the gigantic .waterhen gives life and animation to the morasses and white lakes of the jiunas. In more sheltered punas are respectable farms of several hundred head of cattle, five or seven thousand sheep, and a few hundred alpacas. Not a fence is to be seen ; there is no timber to form one ; but the sheep never stray, being shepherded by the alpacas. They feed and brouse on the edge of the lakes during the summer, and seek the shelter of the neighbouring lulls during the rainy season. The alpaca feeds over the head of tlie sheep, and they get on very well together. The Indian’s partiality for the alpaca is very apparent. He adorns its eai'S with colored wools, and hangs little tinkling bells round its neck, and calls it by endearing gnames, The sheep came from Spain, and small I blame to the Indian if lie has not taken ! kindlv to it. However, during the past

few years considerable*attention has been paid to merinos, and puna merino wool is much esteemed, and fetches a high price in Europe. There is one peculiarity of the climate of the punas which remains to be noticed. Owing to the extreme rarity of the atmosphere, and perhaps also to certaiu vegetable and mineral influences as yet unknown, men and animals arriving there from the coast or low lands are attacked with a disease called in some places the veta, and others sorrocho. Animals are so overpowered that they are unable to stand; and strong men have sank exhausted from jiartial suffocation. Some animals die. Tlie common domestic cat cannot live in it. Many attempts have been made to rear the grimalkin there, but all have failed. And yet this is the climate in which the haciendados have successfully acclimatised sheep and cattle and which the hardiness of the alpaca enables it to resist. The Indians use garlic as a remedy, and I discovered great relief from eating ice. Animals bred in the jiunas do not suffer when taken to lower lauds, where the sorrocho does not exist. But if mules are taken any distance lower down than the punas, unless in good condition, they are always attacked on their return. The climate variations of the punas, are numerous, and the observations have been collected are such'as to deserve investigation at the bands of scientific men. But of these and other particulars of the land of the alpaca, more anon.

Holloway's Ointment and Pills. -—Cheer up.— Sufferers from rheumatism need not despond till a trial has been given to these restorative remedies. Fomentation with warm water, and friction with this invalnable Ointment are the surest antagonists to Rheumatism and Gout. The inflammation of the joints soon yields to this treatment. After rubbing in Holloway’s Ointment and taking his Pills for a few dajTS, the throbbing pain, heat, and swelling begin to subside, the fever decreases, and the patient feels he can move without agony, and sleep calmly without dislocating starts. Holloway’s Pills contribute to dispel the rheumatic principle from the system, facilitate the present recovery, successfully ward off any return of the attack, and confer flexibility and strength upon the injured joint.