candles burning around it, and the people appear to be continually
coming from or going to church. The bells are constantly clanging, and
it seems to a stranger as if the entire city were given up to perpetual
devotions. The next most noticeable thing is the filthiness. The streets
are used as water-closets, in daylight as well as in the dark, and are
never cleaned from one year’s end to another. There are no wagons or
carriages, and only seldom can a cart be seen, the backs of mules, men,
and women being the only vehicles of transportation. There is an
unaccountable prejudice against water in every form, the natives
believing that its frequent use will cause fevers and other diseases.
When they have returned from a journey they never think of washing their
faces for several days, for fear of taking a fever, but wipe off the
flesh with a dry towel. I do not believe a Quito woman ever washes her
face. She keeps it constantly covered with chalk, and looks as if some
one had been trying to whitewash her. I do not know how she would look
_al fresco_, but she has beautiful eyes, lips, and teeth, and a perfect
figure till she reaches the age of thirty-five or thereabouts, after
which she becomes either very fat or very lean.
[Illustration: CHARCOAL PEDDLER.]
If it were not for the climate, Quito would be in the midst of a
perpetual pestilence; but notwithstanding the prevailing filthiness,
there is very little sickness, and pulmonary diseases are unknown.
Mountain fever, produced by cold and a torpid liver, is the commonest
type of disease. The population of the city, however, is gradually
decreasing, and is said to be now about sixty thousand. There were five
hundred thousand people at Quito when the Spaniards came, and a hundred
years ago the population was reckoned at double what it now is. Half the
houses in the town are empty, and to see a new family moving in would
be the sensation of the decade. Most of the finest residences are locked
and barred, and have remained so for years. The owners are usually
political exiles, who are living elsewhere, and can neither sell or rent
their property. Political revolutions are so common, and the results are
always so disastrous to the unsuccessful, that there is a constant
stream of fugitives leaving the State.
Although Ecuador is set down in the geographies as a republic, it is
simply a popish colony, and the power of the Vatican is nowhere felt so
completely as here. The return of a priest from a visit to Rome is as
great an event as the declaration of independence; and so subordinated
is the State to the Church that the latter elects the President, the
Congress, and the judges. Not long ago a law was in force prohibiting
the importation of any books, periodicals, or newspapers without the
sanction of the Jesuits. A crucifix sits in the audience-chamber of the
President and on the desk of the presiding officer of Congress. All the
schools are controlled by the Church, and the children know more about
the lives of the saints than about the geography of their own country.
There is not even a good map of Ecuador.
No lady ever goes to mass (and all go once a day) without a small Indian
boy or a maid-servant following her with a strip of carpet or hassock,
upon which she kneels during service. There are no pews in the churches,
but the floors are marked off like a chess-board, and each square
numbered. These squares, about two or three feet in dimensions, are
rented to those who belong to the parish, and when a man goes to church
he hunts for his place on the floor and kneels down within the narrow
space.
As in Mexico, servants go in droves. Families seldom have less than four
or five, and each adult brings along all his or her kin, who are
expected to lodge and feed with the father’s or mother’s employer. But
it does not cost much to keep them, and the wages of my lady’s maid in
New York or Chicago would support a whole village. They want nothing
but black beans, called frijoles, and tortillas. Meat and bread are
unknown luxuries.
[Illustration: GOVERNMENT BUILDING AT QUITO.]
The Spaniards are famous for their politeness, and in Ecuador, as in all
other parts of South America, courtesy is a part of their religion. The
lowest, meanest man in Quito is politeness personified, but it is all on
the surface. He will stab you or rob you as soon as your back is turned.
The Ecuadorian gentleman will promise you the earth, but will not give
you even a pebble. This hypocrisy results in mutual distrust. No one
ever believes what is said to him; partnerships in business are seldom
formed, and corporations are unknown. If a man gets a little cash he
never invests it in public enterprises, but keeps it in a stocking for
fear he may be swindled--and the fear is well founded. Only the Indians
keep faith, and that exclusively among themselves. To steal from a
Spaniard they consider not only proper but justifiable. The Spaniards
stole all they have from them. They never rob, swindle, or betray one
another. They are as faithful as death to their own race.
[Illustration: COURT OF A QUITO DWELLING.]
Once upon a time there was a revolutionary conspiracy among the Indians.
An uprising was to occur simultaneously all over the republic. As the
natives could neither read nor write, they were given bundles of sticks,
each bundle containing the same number. One was to be burned each day,
and the night after the last was burned was to see the uprising. None
betrayed the secret. Of the many thousands who were admitted to the
conspiracy not one violated faith.
All sorts of labor are done in the most primitive manner. The
agriculturists do not plough, but plant the seed by poking a hole in the
ground with a stick. Threshing and corn-shelling are done by driving
horses over the grain. The hair is removed from hogs, not by hot water
and scraping, but by burning. Everything is done in the slowest and most
difficult way. For that reason, and because the interior is so isolated
from the rest of mankind, the country does not know the meaning of the
words progress and prosperity. Until the influence of the Romish Church
is destroyed, until immigration is invited and secured, Ecuador will be
a desert rich in undeveloped resources. With plenty of natural wealth,
it has neither peace nor industry, and such a thing as a surplus of any
character is unknown. One of the richest of the South American
republics, and the oldest of them all, it is the poorest and most
backward.
On the south-west side of Quito, within half a mile of the city’s
centre, flows the Machangari River, a small, rapid, and never-failing
stream. The rapid fall of the water provides mill-sites every few rods,
which are utilized by six small flour-mills and a small manufactory of
woollen blankets. The six flour-mills, having a total of eighteen run of
stone, give employment to twenty-four men, whose daily wages range from
twelve to twenty-five cents. In the whole woollen blanket manufactory
forty persons are employed, at average daily wages of twelve cents.
Aside from the water-motors mentioned, the only motor in use is a small
steam-engine in a suburban village, used in a sugar refinery where
twelve persons work for wages ranging from twelve to twenty cents per
day. The manufacture of adobe, hard brick, and roofing-tile is carried
on more or less in conjunction, and gives employment to about three
hundred men and women, the women exercising the right of doing any kind
of work
[Illustration: WHAT THE EARTHQUAKES LEFT]
performed by the men. No machinery is used, the brick and tile being
moulded by hand in a box. These workers receive each twelve cents a day.
The making of pottery is carried on in a small way at about fifty
places, furnishing work for about one hundred persons, who when hired
earn twelve cents a day. There is one manufactory of silk and high hats
at which twelve men are employed, at twenty-five cents a day. There are
also about fifty places at which Indian felt hats are made, a total of
one hundred persons being employed, with wages at twelve cents a day.
Matting manufacturing is carried on at three places, at which hand-looms
only are used. The material employed is the fibre of the cactus, which
is very serviceable. Thirty persons at this pursuit earn from eighteen
to twenty cents per day wages. There is no foundery in Quito, and all of
the iron-working is restricted to what is done in a few blacksmith
shops. There is one combined cart and blacksmith shop, at which carts
are made and general repairing is done, employing ten men at twenty-five
cents a day. The industries mentioned have long been established. There
are also numerous tailor shops, shoe-shops, tin-shops, and carpenter
shops. At the latter are made sofas, bureaus, tables, and all other
articles of furniture difficult of transportation by pack-animals.
Nearly all the chairs in use were brought from the United States, packed
in parts, and were put together when sold. Coffins also are made at the
carpenter shops. All of the work done at these shops is done by hand.
[Illustration: A PROFESSIONAL BEGGAR.]
The only industry that has sprung up in recent years is that of
beer-making, which has been inspired and promoted by the German element.
There have been established twelve breweries, which employ a total of
one hundred and twenty men, at average daily wages of twenty cents. The
barley used is of native growth, and is bought at a low price. The hops
are imported from the United States and Europe, and by reason of
expensive transportation are very costly.
[Illustration: AN ECUADOR BELLE.]
Though Quito has a population of about sixty thousand, it has had for a
long period considerable note as a place of art in sculpture and
painting, and has several public-schools of ordinary grade, and three
universities, in charge of the priests, yet it has never been a field in
which literature thrived, or the business of printing flourished. It
contains no newspaper, and but one weekly journal is issued. This is the
oficial paper, and is devoted solely to the publication of official
documents. Its circulation is about one thousand copies, exclusively
among government and foreign officials, and is gratuitous. The principal
printing establishment is owned and managed by the Government, in which
twenty persons are employed. Among its material are one rotary press (on
which the official paper is printed), five hand-lever presses, and a
good assortment of type. No work is done except for government use.
There are five other small printing concerns, each employing from two to
six persons, at which is done the miscellaneous printing of the public.
They use nothing but hand-lever presses. The presses and type were
purchased, in the United States.
Revolutions in Ecuador are frequent, and they usually begin by an
attempt to assassinate the President. The plan of procedure is usually
for the discontented political faction to create a mutiny in the army,
either by bribes to the officers or promises of promotion. As the
private soldiers always obey their officers, like so many automatons,
and are as willing to fight on one side as the other, to secure the
officers is to secure the army. The next step is to seize the barracks
and arsenal, put the President to death, proclaim some one else
provisional dictator, and then call a junta, or convention, to nominate
“a constitutional Executive.” Señor Caamaño seems to bear a charmed
life, for during his term of four years as President he had numerous
remarkable escapes. The last attempt to assassinate him was in January,
1886, while he was journeying from Guayaquil to Quito. He was riding, as
travellers usually do, by night, to escape the heat of the sun, when his
small escort was attacked by a band of mountaineers, and fled, leaving
the President to look out for himself. He jumped from his horse, ran
into the forest which lines the road, and creeping through the trees to
the river, swam to the other side, and made his way, thirty miles on
foot, to the hacienda of a friend, where he knew he would find refuge.
For two days and nights he was in the forest without food, and when he
finally reached a safe haven was totally exhausted. For a week or ten
days he lay ill with a fever, but couriers were sent to Guayaquil and
Quito who arrived there before the reports of his assassination, and
assured the officials of the Government of his safety. At the same time
a mutiny broke out at the military garrisons in both cities, but was
quelled, and the leaders summarily shot.
Since the inauguration of Don Antonio Flores as President, in 1888,
Ecuador has been at peace, and shows bright promises for the future. He
is the foremost statesman of the republic; has ability, wealth,
knowledge, and experience surpassing most of his fellow-citizens, and,
what is equally effectual among the Spanish-American people, the
prestige of a venerated name. His father was a Venezuelan, and at one
time represented New Grenada in the Cortes at Madrid. General Flores
stood with Bolivar at the head of the Revolution for Independence,
organized the Republic of Ecuador, and was its first President. The son
has inherited his father’s ability, his patriotism and zeal, and has
spent his life in the civil, diplomatic, judicial, and military service.
He did not seek the presidency, and therefore entered upon the duties of
his office free of all entanglements, and with the one purpose, to
modernize this Hermit of Republics, and bring its people to the standard
of nineteenth century civilization.
From Guayaquil to Callao, and in fact to the end of the continent, the
western coast of South America presents an unbroken line of mountains,
with a strip of desert between them and the sea. Occasionally some
stream from the mountains brings down the melted snow and opens an
oasis. These oases have been utilized by the planters as far back as the
Conquest, when the industrious Jesuits made as vigorous a war upon the
desert as upon the Incas, and conquered one as easily as they conquered
the other. Wherever this barren strip has been irrigated it produces
enormous crops of sugar, coffee, and other tropical products, and the
whole of it might be redeemed by the introduction of a little capital
and industry. If the money that has been wasted in revolutions had been
expended in the development of its mines, and the soldiers had dug
irrigating ditches with as much ardor as they have fought each other,
there would be no richer country on the globe. Wherever the Incas
touched the earth it produced in profusion, and their wealth was
fabulous. Their empire extended three thousand miles north and south,
and about four hundred miles east and west, from the Pacific to the
great forests of the Amazon, which their simple tools were unable to
subdue.
In no part of the world does nature assume more imposing forms. Deserts
as repulsive as Sahara alternate with valleys as rich and luxuriant as
those of Italy. Eternal summer smiles under the frown of eternal snow.
The rainless region--this desert strip which lies between the Andes and
the sea--is
[Illustration: A HOTEL ON THE COAST.]
about forty miles in width, and the panorama presented to the voyager is
a constant succession of bare and repulsive wastes of sand and rocks,
uninhabited, whose silence is broken only by the incessant surf, the
bark of the sea-lions, and the screams of the water-birds which haunt
its wave-worn and forbidding shore. The coast is dotted with small rocky
islands, which have been the roost of myriads of birds for ages, and
furnish guano for commerce. The steamers seem to furnish them their
only entertainment, and they surround every vessel which passes, soaring
about and above the masts, screaming defiance to the invaders of their
resorts. The water, too, is full of animal life. Nowhere does the sea
offer science so many curious forms of animate nature; monsters unknown
to northern waters can be seen from the decks of the steamers, and at
night their movements about the vessel are shown by a line of fire which
always follows their fins. The water is so strongly impregnated with
phosphorus that every wave is tipped with silver, and every fish that
darts about leaves a brilliant trail like that of a comet. The larger
fishes, the sharks and porpoises, find great sport in swimming races
with the ship, and under the bowsprit a small army of them are to be
seen every evening, sailing along beside the vessel, darting back and
forth before its bows, leaping and plunging over one another. Their
every motion is apparent, and the outlines of their bodies are as
distinct as if drawn with a pencil of fire. Nowhere is this phenomenon
so conspicuous.
The first point beyond Guayaquil is the island of Puna, where Pizarro
first landed, and where he waited with a squad of thirteen men while the
deserters from his expedition went back to Panama in his ships,
promising to send reinforcements, which afterwards came. Beside Puna is
the famous Isle del Muerto (dead man’s island), which looks like a
corpse floating in the water. Just below, and the northernmost town of
Peru, is Tumbez, where Pizarro met the messengers from Atahualpa’s army
who came to ask the object of his visit.
Behind Tumbez are the petroleum deposits of Peru, which have been known
to the natives ever since the times of the Incas, but they were ignorant
of the character or the value of the oil. A Yankee by the name of
Larkin, from Western New York, came down here to sell kerosene, and
recognized the material which the Indians used for lubricating and
coloring purposes as the same stuff he was peddling. An attempt has been
made to utilize the deposits, which are very extensive, but so far they
have not been successful in producing a burning fluid that is either
safe or agreeable.
At each of the little ports on the Peruvian coast the steamer stops and
takes on produce for shipment to Liverpool or Germany. These towns are
simply collections of mud huts, inhabited by fishermen or the employés
of the steamship company, dreary, dusty, and dirty. Back in the country,
along the streams which bring fertility and water down from the
mountains, are places of commercial importance, the residences of rich
hacienda owners, and the scenes of historic events as well as
prehistoric civilization. The products of the country are sugar, coffee,
cocoa, and cotton, while those of the town are “Panama” hats and fleas.
In each one of the ports the natives are busy braiding hats from
vegetable fibres, and the results of their labor find a market at Panama
and in the cities of the coast, where, as in Mexico, a man’s character
is judged by what he wears on his head. The hats are usually made of
_toquilla_, or _pita_, an arborescent plant of the cactus family, the
leaves of which are often several yards long. When cut, the leaf is
dried, and then whipped into shreds almost as fine and tough as silk.
Some of these hats are made of single fibres, with not a splice or an
end from the centre of the crown to the rim. It often requires two or
three months to make them, and the best ones are braided under water, so
as to make the fibre more pliable. They sometimes cost as much as two
hundred and fifty dollars, but last a lifetime, and can be packed away
in a vest-pocket, turned inside out, and worn that way, the inside being
as smooth and well finished as the other. The natives make beautiful
cigar-cases too; but it is difficult for a stranger to purchase either
them or their hats, because they have an idea that all strangers are
rich, and will pay any price that is asked. One old lady offered me a
cigar-case of straw, such as is sold in Japanese stores for one or two
dollars, and politely agreed to sell it for twenty dollars. When I told
her I could get a silver one for that price, she came down to eighteen
dollars, then to twelve dollars, and finally to one dollar. They have
no idea of the value of money, and are habitually imposed upon by local
traders, who exchange food for their straw-work at merely nominal rates,
and then sell the hats at enormous figures.
At each of the ports where the steamer stops an army of officials come
aboard to get a good dinner or breakfast and a cocktail or two at the
expense of the steamship company. They wear gay uniforms and swords, and
there is usually one inspector, or official, for every ten packages of
merchandise. First, there is the “captain of the port,” with his
retinue; then the governor of the district, with his staff; then the
collector of customs, with a battalion of inspectors; and, finally, the
commandante of the military garrison and all his subordinates. The deck
of the vessel fairly swarms with them, and as the steamer’s arrival is
the only event to give variety to the monotony of their lives, they
celebrate it for all it is worth. It is little wonder that the
governments of these South American countries are poor, with all these
tax-eaters at every little town of four or five hundred inhabitants.
[Illustration: CUSTOMS OFFICERS.]
There are a great many more railroads in Peru than is generally
supposed. Nearly all of the coast towns have a line connecting them
with the plantations of the interior; and as there are no harbors, but
only open roadsteads, expensive iron piers have been constructed through
the surf from which merchandise is lifted into barges or lighters and
taken to the ships, which anchor a mile or so from the shore. Where
there are no piers the lighters are run through the surf when the tide
is high, are loaded at low tide, and then floated off to buoys to await
the arrival of vessels.
[Illustration: A HOME ON THE COAST.]
All along the coast there is a system of “deck trading” carried on by
the people of the country. Men and women come on board with market
produce, fruits, and other articles, which are strewn about the deck,
and are sold to people who visit the vessel at each port for the purpose
of buying. These traders are charged passage-money and freight by the
steamship companies, but are a nuisance to the other passengers. Each
female trader brings a mattress to sleep upon, a chair to use during the
day, her own cooking and chamber utensils, and spends a greater part of
her life abroad, sailing from one port to another.
At Payta we took on a battalion of Peruvian soldiers, with one
brass-mounted officer to every seven men. The Peruvian soldier always
has his wife with him; at least there is a woman who maintains such a
relation. The ceremony of marriage is not observed, nor is it to any
great extent in civil life, for the expense of matrimony is so great
that among the _cholos_, as the peasants are called, men and women live
their lives together without any formality, and with the sanction of
public sentiment, even if they lack the sanction of the law. For this
the Catholic Church is responsible, and to it can be traced the cause of
the illegitimacy of more than half of the population. The fee charged by
the priests for performing the ceremony of marriage is so excessive that
the poor cannot pay it; hence marriage is practically placed under what
may be called a prohibitory tariff. This prevails in all of the South
American countries where the Church still holds its power, but in those
which are now under the control of the Liberal party the rite of civil
marriage has been established by law, and the ceremony now costs from
twenty-five cents to a dollar.
With each company of Peruvian troops is a squad of women called
_rabonas_, generally one to every three or four men, volunteers who
serve without pay but receive rations, and are given transportation by
the Government. They are always with the men--in camp, on the march, and
in battle. In camp they do the cooking and other necessary work; on the
march they share the exposure and fatigue, being treated exactly as the
men are, and do most of the foraging for the messes to which they
belong. In battle they nurse their own wounded, rob the dead, cut the
throats of enemies whom they find lying alive on the field, carry water
and ammunition, and perform other brutal or useful services. They are
always enumerated in the rosters of troops and in the reports of
casualties, which read: so many men and so many rabonas killed and
wounded; for they share the soldier’s death as well as his privations.
Some of these wives of the regiment have children with them, and there
is scarcely a company without a dozen or so little youngsters, without
any clew to their paternity, following their mothers’ heels. They are
poor, miserable, degraded creatures, just one degree above the dogs with
which
[Illustration: PERUVIAN SOLDIER AND RABONA.]