THE BACK TRAIL AMONG THE AYMARAS
At first the plateau was dotted with the lines of converging burro- and
llama-trains, but, as the morning passed, there was nothing but the
lonely distance of the plateau, with here and there a tiny speck of a
solitary pack-train. The air had warmed rapidly under the sun; the light
breeze had the touch of a northern spring, and I yielded to the
seductive suggestion and strapped my heavy woolen coat to the saddle.
Five minutes later I halted and gladly put it on once more, for the thin
air was treacherous in its allurements.
Somewhere about the middle of the day we halted for breakfast at Cocuta,
a native _tambo_ or wayside inn, though the pack-train pushed on slowly,
nibbling the bunch-grass as it went. The tambo was surrounded by a high,
thick mud-brick wall that inclosed something over an acre of ground, and
inside this fortress were the little mud buildings, granaries, and
corrals. An old Aymará woman cooked our breakfast over a llama-dung fire
in one corner of the room, and it was served on a rough table over by a
dried mud bench that was built against two of the walls. The filthy room
was lighted only by the small, low doors, the high, mud sills of which
still further shut out light and ventilation, and the fetid atmosphere
was rich in its ethnological and entomological suggestion. A chicken
soup, reeking with the mutton tallow of chalona and with the head and
feet of the fowl floating in the grease, made the first course; then
came _lomita_ (the tenderloin of a steak), and eggs fried in mutton
tallow. We produced some coffee from the saddle-bags and the old woman
fluttered about and brewed a pretty fair article. It was at this same
Cocuta, on another occasion, that, in riding to La Paz, I ran into a
band of drunken _ladrones_ and, as some of the band took the trail after
me, it gave a most unwelcome and interesting zest to the rest of that
night ride.
That night we slept in a second tambo, smaller, but also with a thick
mud wall inclosing the collection of mud huts. The mules were turned
loose on the plateau to graze till morning, their hobbled feet a
guarantee of their not straying. At sunset came the piercing cold, when
even the barricaded door of the mud room and the steaming human warmth
inside proved grateful. A wide platform of mud-bricks was the bed--it
was the sole furniture--and on it we piled the sheepskins from the
pack-saddles, and over an alcohol lamp we made a thin tea and warmed up
some tinned things. An old Aymará woman was apparently the sole
caretaker of this tambo, but she viewed us with unlovely eyes and would
furnish nothing. Sullen and surly that night, she was all ingratiating
smiles the next morning when she saw my camera. She scuttled inside her
hut and then reappeared in some hasty finery, in which she trotted
anxiously about with conciliatory grimaces and pleadings in guttural
Aymará that her picture be taken. How she knew what a camera was for
and, further, why she was not afraid of it were mysteries, for
invariably I found all other Aymarás hostile against the evil witchcraft
of the little black box. As it was yet only early dawn, there was not
sufficient light, but I satisfied her by clicking the shutter.
After the heated air in the dark hut, the first moment outside in the
pure, still cold was like breathing needles; the long stretch of plateau
was soft with white frost, every grimy straw in the thatched roofs
glistened like silver with its coating of ice, and the morning ablutions
were performed through a hole broken in the crust of ice in a near-by
brook. A cup of tea boiled over the alcohol lamp was the only breakfast,
and then we started. As we climbed into the saddles the old Aymará woman
hovered in the gateway clucking pleased Aymará benedictions for her
photograph.
For some reason of his own Rodriguez elected to leave the main trail
beyond this tambo and take one of the little-used back trails to Sorata.
It was very much shorter but, as we afterward learned, is little used on
account of the surly, hostile attitude of the Aymarás of that district
and, except for a large outfit, is not considered safe. Here the Aymarás
are more secluded and view intrusion with aggressive suspicion; three
months before they had attacked an outfit and killed the trader. Those
who passed no longer greeted us with the "Tata!" Instead, they would
turn sullenly out of the trail to avoid us as we passed, or stop and
view us with unmistakable hostility. When we halted for a hasty bite by
the side of a cold brook, Rodriguez held the whole pack-train and the
arrieros close by, and did not allow them to go ahead, as on the day
before.
Just before branching off into this unused trail we came upon a large
party of Aymarás carrying, in relays, a stretcher on their shoulders
that was inclosed with cloth, so that it resembled a sort of palanquin;
six of them were carrying it at a time in a ground-eating dog-trot and
about each half-mile they would be relieved by six others, the transfer
of the stretcher being effected without jolt or jar. It proved to be a
wealthy Bolivian _haciendado_ who was ill, and was being carried in this
simple ambulance to the doctors in La Paz by his own Indians. The trot
and the burden were nothing to them; I have seen an Aymará boy carry
forty pounds on his back and trot hour after hour without apparent
difficulty and come into camp at night but little behind the mounted man
he was accompanying. Yet at this altitude, unless one has become
gradually accustomed, even walking is a heavy effort.
[Illustration: AYMARA HERDERS PLAYED THEIR WEIRD FLUTES.]
On the new trail the dead level of the plateau gave way to more rolling
country, the ragged, snow-capped line of mountains at the horizon came
closer; Huayna-Potosi loomed on our right, and, growing more impressive
every hour, was the great, white mass of Mount Sorata, dead ahead. Then
the rolling country closed in, and narrower valleys succeeded, with the
rugged foot-hills on each side. In this part was an enormous
breeding-ground for llamas; for miles the hills were dotted with them.
Baby llamas, very new, and still blinking at the strange world, huddled
timidly in behind a tuft of bunch-grass or behind some small boulder,
while the queer, goose-necked mother stood near with apparent
indifference; little llamas in all stages of adolescence and awkwardness
gamboled on the hillsides, and herds dotting the slopes looked for all
the world like big, stiff-necked, grotesque sheep. Among them were the
Aymará herders who, like traditional shepherds, played their weird and
mournful flutes or pipes. Over and over again came the same strain,
which carried for miles in the thin, still air.
One of its little phrases curiously reminded me of that chanted taunt of
my boyhood, "Over the fence is ou-oot!"
Rarely does the Aymará make his own flute or pipe, simple though it is;
their manufacture is a native industry by itself. Like a true musician,
the Aymará must have his instrument just so, and up in the higher
altitudes the flutes are made and brought down to be sold in the market
on the days of fiesta. His single weapon, a sling of the pattern made
famous by David and Goliath, is of twisted llama-wool, and will throw a
stone the size of a lemon. They develop a wonderful skill in its use.
On this lonely trail we came upon a castle, a veritable castle of the
story books! Alone, grim and battlemented, it stood boldly outlined
against the landscape. It was not large, but it was, or had been,
perfect in every medieval detail, and was constructed of mud bricks from
outer walls to keep. There was a moat, dry and unkept and now fallen
upon evil days; the high surrounding wall was loopholed, and the fringe
of battlements had been eaten away in places by the driving storms. The
keep was visible rising above the wall, while galleries and overhanging
balconies showed the purposes and possibilities of protection, even
should the outer wall be successfully stormed by some ancient foe; the
single, heavy outer gate in the wall was barred, and not a sign of life
or of a retainer was to be seen. For miles around the country was
deserted and bare, and in the desolate mountains remained this substance
of the past like a grim, dramatic ghost of ancient days. Back on this
unused trail it is but little known; Rodriguez knew of it, but that was
all, except that he had a very positive idea that its owner or occupant
did not care for visitors--but it was occupied.
Monotonously through the afternoon the pack-train wound through the
narrow valleys, and closer came the mountains and more chill the air
sweeping downward from their fields of snow. The melting snows flooded
the slopes and valleys in innumerable brooks; often the trail itself was
lost in wide expanses of icy water. The sun set, and with growing
darkness came the increased bitterness of the piercing cold. Along this
trail there was no shelter except here and there the little mud huts of
the Aymará.
The clouds rolling low overhead left the night pitch-black; a gale of
wind sprang up and hurled itself in our teeth, varying its monotony now
and again with a squall of snow that stung like a blizzard. Without a
stumble the sure-footed mules kept the trail in the darkness up and down
through abrupt gullies or fording some icy stream that left their
bellies a fringe of icicles, while, during some lull in the blast, the
tinkle of the bell on the leading pack-animal would drift back to us.
At last the old, deserted tambo for which we had been aiming was
reached. By the aid of a few matches--for the lantern was carefully
packed on some mule indistinguishable in the blackness--half a dozen
Aymarás were found sleeping in the litter on the floor of the mud room,
for here there was not even a mud bench. There was no barricade to close
the door, and a score of eddies whirled in from the broken thatch
overhead. The arrieros drove the Aymarás out--they were part of a
pack-train, and not natives of that district--and threw the sheepskin
pads over the muddy ground. The alcohol-lamp, screened from drafts by
saddles, sheepskins, and hats, finally furnished a lukewarm tin of soup,
some thin, warm tea, and some eggs, which though warm, could hardly be
considered cooked. The bitter wind swept through the openings, and no
candle could survive, so purely by a sense of touch the frozen spurs and
puttees were unbuckled for the instant sleep that came, clothes and all.
At the break of day we were again in the saddle. The trail the previous
day had been hard and rough, but following a general level; but from now
on it began steadily to rise. Early in the morning we had gained upon
Mount Sorata; in the deceptive distance it loomed apparently only a few
miles ahead, yet its nearest snow-field was thirty miles away. Lake
Titicaca is only a few miles distant, and one of its long arms reaches
back into the country in a vast, shallow lagoon covered with a water
growth through which swim myriads of fearless water-fowls. In some
ancient time a causeway was built over this long arm, solid and
substantial, and on each side, as we passed over, ducks and snipe and
waders eyed us impudently, the length of a fishing rod away, and one, a
snipe, flickered along almost under the heels of the pack-mules. Off in
the distance was the old Aymará city of Achicachi, still surrounded by
the remains of an old mud wall that dates from before Pizarro, where the
frosted thatch and tile roofs glittered in the sunlight against the
distant cold blue horizon of Lake Titicaca.
Beyond the causeway the trail rose steadily to the mountain pass. The
cold mists from Sorata swept down and the line of mules disappeared in
its chill fog. It thins, slender wraiths of eddying vapor drift past,
and we ride through the ruins of an ancient Aymará town where there was
nothing left but the rectangular lines of stone débris; the few streets
were still plainly marked, though the village has been dead these many
centuries. Its name is lost; it is not even a tradition. From under some
ruined rubbish an Aymará head was thrust out, framed in the acrid, thin
smoke from the wretched, make-shift hut; a few sheep were herded within
the ruined inclosures, and other small flocks were grazing near. The
head proved to belong to their shepherd, tending them until the time of
their transmutation into chalona.
[Illustration: The Few Streets Were Still Plainly Marked, Though the
Village Has Been Dead These Many Centuries]
Now and again an Aymará shrine loomed through the mist beside the trail,
in its niche an offering of wilted flowers and some cigarette pictures,
and above, in a crevice of the stones and dried mud, a crooked twig
cross. Sometimes we met an Aymará, with a bundle of reeds, sitting in
the shelter of a rough stone wind-break making and testing his reed
flutes. He whittled the reed and tested each finger-hole as he scraped
it larger. He looked up, and again we were saluted with the respectful
"Tata!" for in order to reach the last stage of the mountain pass we had
swung back on the main trail, where the Indians were more sociable. More
stone and mud shrines appeared, each with its offering of propitiation
to the gods of these higher places and each with its twig cross above.
Higher, rougher, and steeper grew the trail, often in a zigzag up some
precipitous gorge. A tiny, scattering Indian village came in sight,
Huaylata, perched on a high, rolling part of this Andean pass. Its mud
huts were smaller, grimier, and drearier, if possible, than those that
we had passed on the great plateau. A few Aymarás appeared and tried to
sell us _cebada_, or barley, for the mules; an old woman, squatting on
the ground, weaving a poncho on her log loom, stopped long enough to
look over our cavalcade curiously out of her bleared eyes red with
smoke. Through the little door of her hut the interior was visible,
stacked with chalona half prepared and waiting for the sun to shine
before it was moved out into the open ground for further drying.
Indifferently she watched me extract the camera from my saddle-bag, but
when the brass lens pointed in her direction, she clattered vigorously
in her dialect and scuttled into the house to hide. The other Aymarás
were instantly hostile, and I worked a scheme that had often succeeded.
I turned my back to them and reversed the camera, with the lens pointing
backward under my arm. This would almost invariably get the picture. If
it did not, I would stand behind the broad shoulders of one of the party
while I adjusted the camera, and then have him step suddenly to one side
as I pressed the button. Otherwise they would scatter like a flock of
Chinamen under similar conditions, and with angry mutterings.