was quinine, the drug made from the bark of the cinchona-tree, which was
discovered in Bolivia by a Franciscan friar in the early days of the
Conquest, and was called cinchona in honor of the Countess of Conchona,
whose husband was the Viceroy of Peru. She introduced it into Spain as a
remedy for fevers, and there is no drug in the catalogue that has been
used in such quantities or with such success by suffering mankind. The
entire supply formerly came from Peru and Bolivia, and it was known as
Peruvian bark, but afterwards the forests along the entire chain of the
Andes were found to contain it, and it furnished one of the chief
articles of export from South America for three centuries. The supply
has been greatly diminished by the destruction of the trees, as it was
the habit formerly to cut down the trunk, and strip it as well as the
branches of the bark. Nowadays the forests are protected by law, and the
trees are allowed to stand, a portion of the bark being stripped off
each year, which nature replaces again.
[Illustration: A BOLIVIAN CAVALRYMAN.]
England, with that provident foresight which characterizes much of her
political economy, several years ago sent agents into Ecuador, Peru, and
Bolivia, under the direction of the celebrated botanist Mr. Spruce, and
made a collection of cinchona plants, which were taken to Java, Ceylon,
and India, and there have been transplanted and cultivated with great
success and profit. It is found that under proper treatment the tree
produces a very much greater amount of quinine, of a much superior
quality, and at less cost than the bark can be gathered in the mountains
of South America, so that shipments have almost entirely ceased, and the
market receives its supply from the British possessions.
[Illustration: A HOME IN THE ANDES.]
Another plant is coming into prominence, and its export has very largely
increased within the last few years. This is the coca, from which
cocoaine and other medicinal and nerve stimulants are made. In the
valleys of the Andes there are, and have been from time immemorial,
extensive plantations of the coca shrub. It is indigenous in these
regions, but the natives of Peru and Bolivia cultivate the plant in
terraces which are likened to the vineyards of Tuscany and the Holy
Land. _Erythroxylon coca_ is allied to the common flax, and forms, says
Dr. Johnston, a shrub of six or eight feet, resembling our blackthorn,
with small white flowers and bright green leaves. The leaves, of which
there may be three or four crops in the year, are collected by the
women and children, and dried in the sun, after which they are ready for
use, and form the usual money exchange in some districts, the workmen
being paid in coca-leaves. Among the Peruvians and Bolivians the
coca-leaves are rolled with a little unslaked lime into a ball
(_acullico_) and chewed in the mouth. Coca-chewing resembles in some
respects the smoking of opium. Both must be taken apart, and with
deliberation. The coca chewer, three or four times in the day, retires
to a secluded spot, lays down his burden, and stretches himself perhaps
beneath a tree. Slowly from the _chuspa_, or little pouch, which is ever
at his girdle, the leaves and the lime are brought forth. The ball is
formed and chewed for perhaps fifteen or thirty minutes, and then the
toiler rises refreshed as quietly as he lay down, and returns to that
monotonous round of labor in which the coca is his only and much-prized
distraction. Some take it to excess, and to these the name of _coquero_
is given. This is particularly common among white Peruvians of good
family, and hence the name “Blanco Coquero” in that country is a term of
reproach equivalent to our “habitual drunkard.” The Indians regard the
coca with extreme reverence. Von Tschudi, the Austrian scientist, who
made the most thorough study of the ancient customs of the Incas, says,
“During divine worship the priests chewed coca-leaves, and unless they
were supplied with them it was believed that the favor of the gods could
not be propitiated. It was also deemed necessary that the supplicator
for Divine grace should approach the priests with an acullico in his
mouth. It is believed that any business undertaken without the
benediction of coca-leaves could not prosper, and to the shrub itself
worship was rendered. During an interval of more than three hundred
years Christianity has not been able to subdue this deep-rooted
idolatry, for everywhere we find traces of belief in the mysterious
powers of this plant. The excavators in the mines of Cerro del Pasco
throw chewed coca upon hard veins of metal, in the belief that it
softens the ore and renders it more easy to work. The Indians even at
the present time put coca-leaves into the mouths of dead persons, in
order to secure them a favorable reception on their entrance into
another world, and when a Peruvian on a journey falls in with a mummy,
he, with timid reverence, presents to it some coca-leaves as his pious
offering.”
[Illustration: JUAN FERNANDEZ.]
The coca-plant resembles tea and hops in the nature of its active
principles, although differing entirely from them in its effects. In the
coqueros the latter are not inviting. “They are,” says Dr. Von Tschudi,
“a bad breath, pale lips and gums, greenish and stumpy teeth, and an
ugly black mark at the angles of the mouth. The inveterate coquero is
known at the first glance; his unsteady gait, his yellow skin, his dim
and sunken eyes encircled by a purple ring, his quivering lips, and his
general apathy all bear evidence of the baneful effect of the coca-juice
when taken in excess.” The general influence of moderate doses is gently
soothing and stimulating; but coca has in addition a special and
remarkable power in enabling those who consume it to endure sustained
labor in the absence of other food.
[Illustration: CUMBERLAND BAY.]
Down the coast, just before reaching the city of Valparaiso, is an
island which possesses an interest for every one who has been a boy.
Occasionally an excursion visits the place, and the Englishmen, who
constitute a large fraction of the population of Valparaiso, with what
few Americans there are, go over to spend a day or two, and renew their
youth. It is the island of Juan Fernandez, where Robinson Crusoe and his
man Friday, “who kept things tidy,” had the experience that has given
the world of boys as much enjoyment as any that ever came from a book.
There was a Robinson Crusoe--there is not a doubt of it--and there was a
man Friday too, and the island stands to-day exactly as it is described
in the narrative; but the surprising adventures of Mr. Crusoe as
therein related do not correspond exactly with the local traditions of
the story. The island was a favorite stopping-place for vessels in the
South Seas, as it has good ship-timber, plenty of excellent water,
abounds in fruits, goats, rabbits, and other flesh for food, and the
rocks on the coast are covered with lobsters, shrimps, and crayfish. It
was a popular resort for buccaneers also, who ran into a well-protected
harbor to repair damages and get provisions. Juan Fernandez, a famous
Spanish navigator, discovered it in 1563, and the King of Spain gave him
a patent to the island, but as he never occupied it his title lapsed. In
1709 the Scotchman Selkirk, or Selcraig, became mutinous on board the
ship _Cinque Ports_, and had to choose between being hung at the
yard-arm or put ashore at Juan Fernandez alone. He took the latter
alternative, and was left on the rocks with his sailor’s kit and a small
supply of provisions. To his surprise, after he had been on the island a
few days, he found a companion in an Indian from the Mosquito Coast of
Central America, who some years before had come down on the pirate
_Damphier_, and going ashore on a hunting expedition, was lost and
abandoned by his comrades. This was the man Friday. Some years after,
Selkirk and the Indian were rescued by Captain Rogers, of an English
merchant-ship, and taken to Southampton, where the Scotchman told his
story to Daniel Defoe, and it got into print, with some romantic
exaggeration.
The island is accurately described in the story, and the visitor who is
familiar with “Robinson Crusoe” can find the cave, the mountain-paths,
and other haunts of the hero without difficulty; but Defoe has located
it in the wrong geographical position, having placed it on the other
side of the continent, and mixed up Montevideo with Valparaiso. It is
about twenty-three miles long and ten miles wide in the broadest part,
and is covered with beautiful hills and lovely valleys, the highest peak
reaching an elevation of nearly three thousand feet. A hundred years ago
the Spaniards introduced blood-hounds to kill off the goats and rabbits,
and to keep the pirates away, but the scheme did not work. Upon her
independence, in 1821, Chili made Juan Fernandez a penal colony, but
thirty years after the prisoners mutinied, slaughtered the guards, and
escaped. Then it was leased to a cattle company, which has now thirty
thousand head of horned cattle and as many sheep grazing upon the hills.
There are fifty or sixty inhabitants, mostly ranchmen and their
families, who tend the herds and raise vegetables for the Valparaiso
market.
Great care has been taken to preserve the relics of Alexander Selkirk’s
stay upon the island, and his cave and huts remain just as he left them.
In 1868 the officers of the British man-of-war _Topaz_ erected a marble
tablet to mark the famous lookout from which Mr. Crusoe, like the
Ancient Mariner, used to watch for a sail, “and yet no sail from day to
day.” The inscription reads: “In memory of Alexander Selkirk, mariner, a
native of Largo, county of Fife, Scotland; who lived upon this island in
complete solitude for four years and four months. He was landed from the
_Cinque Ports_ galley, 96 tons, 16 guns, A.D. 1704, and was taken off in
the _Duke_, privateer, on February 12th, 1709. He died Lieutenant of
H.B.M.S. _Weymouth_: 47 years. This tablet is erected upon Selkirk’s
lookout by Commodore Powell and the officers of H.B.M.S. _Topaz_, A.D.
1868.”
[Illustration: TABLET TO ALEXANDER SELKIRK.]
No one ever goes to Juan Fernandez without bringing away rocks and
sticks as relics of the place. There is a very fine sort of wood
peculiar to the island which makes beautiful canes, as it has a rare
grain and polishes well.
SANTIAGO.
THE CAPITAL OF CHILI.
Nature never intended there should be a city where Valparaiso stands,
but the enterprise of the Chillanos, aided by English and German
capital, has built there the finest port on the west coast of South
America, and the only one with all the modern improvements. The harbor
is spacious and beautiful, and ten months in the year it is perfectly
safe for shipping, but during the remaining two months, when northern
gales are frequent, vessels are often driven from their anchorage, and
compelled to cruise about to avoid being dashed upon the rocks on which
the city is built. The harbor is circular in form, with an entrance a
mile or so wide facing the north. A breakwater built across the entrance
would give the shipping perfect protection, but the sea is so deep--more
than a hundred fathoms--that such a work is considered impracticable. In
this harbor, drawn up in lines like men-of-war ready for review, are
hundreds of vessels, bearing the flags of almost every nation on the
earth except that of our own. Occasionally the Stars and Stripes are
seen, but so seldom that, as an American resident expressed it, “they
cure all the sore eyes in town.” Trade is practically controlled by
Englishmen, all commercial transactions are calculated in pounds
sterling, and the English language is almost exclusively spoken upon the
street and in the shops. An English paper is printed there, English
goods are almost exclusively sold, and this city is nothing more than an
English colony.
In Valparaiso, as everywhere else in Chili, there is an intense
prejudice against the United States, growing out of the attitude assumed
by our Government during the late war with Peru. The prejudice has been
aggravated and stimulated by the English residents. This, with the
natural arrogance of the Chillanos, who think they have the finest
country on earth, and that the United States is their only rival, makes
it rather disagreeable sometimes for Americans who go there to reside.
For this and other reasons our commerce with Chili has fallen off from
millions to hundreds of thousands, and it will be difficult to increase
it as long as the prejudice of the people exists, and lines of English,
French, German, and Italian vessels connect Valparaiso with the markets
of Europe.
[Illustration: THE HARBOR OF VALPARAISO.]
There is no steam communication with the United States, and all freight
is sent in sailing-vessels around the Horn or by way of Hamburg or
Havre. The freight charges from Valparaiso to New York by way of the
Isthmus are more than double those to the European ports, and it is
about thirty per cent. cheaper to ship goods from New York to Europe,
and from there to South America, than by way of Aspinwall and Panama.
Passenger fares as well as freight are subject to this discrimination.
One can go from Valparaiso to Europe _via_ the Strait of Magellan--a
voyage of forty-one days--cheaper than to Panama--a voyage of twenty
days, which ought to be made in ten. It costs about ten cents per mile
on a steamer from Valparaiso to the Isthmus, to California, or to New
York, and about two cents a mile to Europe. As if this were not enough,
the steamship company, a British corporation which controls navigation
on the west coast, arranges its time-tables so as not to connect with
the New York steamers at the Isthmus, and its steamers usually arrive at
Panama the day after the Pacific Mail ship leaves Aspinwall, so as to
subject the traveller to the expense and annoyance of ten days’ delay on
the fever-haunted Chagres. Freight and mails receive the same treatment,
and every possible obstacle is raised to divert trade from the United
States to Europe.
Valparaiso means “the Vale of Paradise,” but somehow or other there was
a misconception in this particular, for there is no vale and no symptoms
of Paradise. An almost perpendicular mountain ridge forms a crescent
around the bay, towards the shores of which descend steep, rocky
escarpments. Here and there watercourses have furrowed ravines, or
barancas, as they are called, which offer the only means of reaching the
outer world. Along the narrow strip of sand which lies between the sea
and the cliffs the town stretches three or four miles. In some places
there is width enough for only a single street, at others for three or
four running parallel to each other, but they only extend a few blocks.
The one street, the only artery of commerce in Valparaiso, is “the Calle
Victoria,” stretching around the entire harbor, and skirted by all the
banks and hotels, the counting-houses of the wholesale firms, the shops
of the retailers, the Government buildings, and the fine private
residences. The rocky cliffs have been terraced as the town has grown,
and the city now extends back upon the hills a long distance, one man’s
house being above another’s, and reached by stairways, winding roads,
and steam “lifts,” which carry passengers up inclined planes, like those
at Niagara and Pittsburg. What roads there are were laid out by the
goats that formerly fed upon the mountain side, and these twist about in
the most confusing and circuitous fashion. One has to stop and pant for
breath as he climbs them, and an alpenstock is needed in coming down.
The hacks in Valparaiso have three horses attached to them, and the
teaming is done in carts drawn by four oxen.
An evening view of Valparaiso from a steamer in the bay is quite novel,
as the lines of lights, one above the other, give the appearance of a
city turned up on end. Electric lamps are placed upon the crests of the
cliffs, throwing their rays over into the streets and upon the terraces
below with the effect of moonlight. During the day, however, the
irregular rows of houses, of different shapes and elevations, clinging
to the precipices, look as if a strong wind might blow them overboard,
or an earthquake shake them off into the bay.
The business portion of Valparaiso along the beach shows some fine
architecture, more elaborate than is to be seen elsewhere in Central and
South America, there being a rivalry in handsomely carved façades and
other adornments. The shops and stores are as large, and contain as
complete an assortment of goods, as those in any city in the world.
There is no city in the United States having the population of
Valparaiso (125,000) with so many fine shops, and such a display of
costly and luxurious articles. The people are wealthy and prosperous,
the foreign element is large and rich, and the place is famous, as is
Santiago, the capital, for the extravagance of its citizens. Some of the
private residences are palatial in their proportions and equipments, and
millions of dollars are represented under the roofs of bankers and
merchants. There are clubs as fine as the average in New York or London,
public reading-rooms, libraries, picture-galleries, and all the elements
which go to make up modern civilization. The parks and plazas are filled
with beautiful fountains, and with statuary of bronze and marble, much
of which, to the shame of Chili, was stolen from the public and private
gardens of Peru during the late war. The Custom-house is being torn away
to give place to a magnificent monument to Arthur Pratt, an Irish hero
of that struggle. Pratt’s reckless courage made him the ideal of all
that is great and noble in the mind of the Chillanos, who have erected a
monument to his memory in nearly every town. Streets and shops, saloons,
mines, opera-houses, and even lotteries are named in his honor, and the
greatest national tribute is to destroy the old custom-house in order to
erect his monument in the most conspicuous place in the principal city.
The oddest thing to be seen in Valparaiso is the female street-car
conductors. The street-car managers of Chili have added another
occupation to the list of those in which women may engage. The
experiment was first tried during the war with Peru, when all the
able-bodied men were sent to the army, and proved so successful that
their employment has become permanent, to the advantage, it is said, of
the companies, the women, and the public. The first impression one forms
of a woman with a bell-punch taking up fares is not favorable, but the
stranger soon becomes accustomed to this as to all other novelties, and
concludes that it is not such a bad idea after all. The street-cars are
double-deckers, with seats upon the roof as well as within, and the
driver occupies a perch on the rear platform, taking the fare as the
passenger enters. The Chillano is a rough individual; he is haughty,
arrogant, impertinent, and abusive. There is more intemperance in Chili
than in any other of the South American States, and consequently more
quarrels and murders, but the female conductors are seldom disturbed in
the discharge of their duties, and when they are, the rule is to call
upon the policemen,
[Illustration: VICTORIA STREET, VALPARAISO.]
who stand at every corner, to eject the obstreperous passenger.
Street-car riding is a popular amusement with the young men about town.
Those who make a business of flirting with the conductors are called
“mosquitoes” in local parlance, because they swarm so thickly around the
cars, and are so great a nuisance. Not long ago a comic paper printed a
cartoon in which some of the best-known faces of the swells of
Valparaiso appeared on the bodies of mosquitoes swarming around the car
of “Conductor 97,” who had the reputation of being the prettiest girl on
the line. This put a stop to the practice for a while, and caused some
of the fashionable young men to retire to the country, but it was soon
resumed again. The conductors, or conductresses, are usually young, and
sometimes quite pretty, being commonly of the mixed race--of Spanish and
Indian blood. They wear a neat uniform of blue flannel, with a jaunty
Panama hat, and a many-pocketed white pinafore, reaching from the breast
to the ankles, and trimmed with dainty frills. In these pockets they
carry small change and tickets, while hanging to a strap over their
shoulders is a little shopping-bag, in which is a lunch, a
pocket-handkerchief, and surplus money and tickets. Each passenger, when
paying his fare, receives a yellow paper ticket, numbered, which he is
expected to destroy. The girls are charged with so many tickets, and
when they report at headquarters are expected to return money for all
that are missing, any deficit being deducted from their wages, which are
twenty-five dollars per month.
The women of Chili are not so pretty as their sisters in Peru. They are
generally larger in feature and figure, have not the dainty feet and
supple grace of the Lima belles, and lack their voluptuous languor. In
Valparaiso half the ladies are of the Saxon type, and blonde hair looks
grateful when one has seen nothing but midnight tresses for months.
Here, too, modern costumes are worn more generally than in other South
American countries, and the shops are full of Paris bonnets. But the
black manta, with its fringe of lace, is still common enough to be
considered the costume of the country, and is always worn to mass in the
morning. The manta is becoming to almost everybody. It hides the defects
of homely forms and figures, and heightens grace and beauty. It makes an
old woman look young, a stout woman appears more slender under its
graceful folds, and even a skeleton would look coquettish when wrapped
in the rich embroidery which some bear.
In Chili mantas and skirts of white flannel are worn by
_penitentas_--women who have committed sin, and thus advertise their
penitence, or those who have taken some holy vow to get a measure nearer
heaven, and who go about the street with downcast eyes, looking at
nothing and recognizing no one. They hover around the churches, and sit
for hours crouched before some saint or crucifix. In the great cathedral
at Santiago and in the smaller churches everywhere these penitentas, in
their snow-white garments, are always to be seen on their knees, or
posing in other uncomfortable postures, looking like statues. They
cluster in groups around the confessionals, waiting to receive
absolution from some fat and burly father, that they may rid their
bodies of the mark of penitence they carry, and their souls of sin.
Ladies of high social position and great wealth are commonly found among
the penitentas, as well as young girls of beauty and winning grace. The
women of Chili are as pious as the men are proud, and this method of
securing absolution is quite fashionable. Souls that cannot be purged by
this penitential dress retire to a convent in the outskirts of the city,
called the Convent of the Penitentes, where they scourge themselves with
whips, mortify the flesh with sackcloth, sleep in ashes and upon stone
floors, and feed themselves on mouldy crusts, until the priests by whose
advice they go give them absolution. They are usually women who have
been unfaithful to their marriage vows, or girls who have yielded to
temptation. After the society season and the carnivals, at the end of
the summer, when people return from the fashionable resorts, and at the
beginning of Lent, these places are full. For those whose sins have
been too great to be washed out by this process, whose shame has been
published to the world, and who are unfitted under social laws to
associate with the pure, other convents are open as a refuge. Young
mothers without husbands are here cared for, and their babes are taken
to an orphan asylum in the neighborhood, to be reared by the nuns for
the priesthood and other religious orders.
It was from one of these places that the famous Henry Meiggs got his
second wife, and the adventure is still related with great gusto by the
gossips of Chili. An American dentist named Robinson lived in the same
block on which the convent was situated, and from the roof of his house
the garden of the nuns was plainly visible. Boccaccio never told a more
romantic tale, for it involved notes tied to stones and thrown into the
garden, rope-ladders, excited nuns, infuriated parents, and an outraged
Church. But the adventure was followed by forgiveness and marriage, and
the widow now lives in Santiago, in the luxury which her legacy from the
great railroad contractor provides.