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But north and south of Peru lay thousands of miles of sun-parched pampa, on the west lay the rolling Pacific patrolled by the enemy's ships, eastward lay the Cordilleras soaring into the clouds the only passage through them held by Chilean soldiers.
Even there, however, it is not wholly lost, for it revives in the cold, lofty continent of Antarctica, where it coalesces once more with the other great tetrahedral ridges of Africa and Australia. It is easy to see that these great cordilleras have turned most of the earth's chief rivers toward the Atlantic and the Arctic Oceans.
Higher up on the slopes of the Cordilleras, beyond the limits of the maize and of the quinoa, a grain bearing some resemblance to rice, and largely cultivated by the Indians, was to be found the potato, the introduction of which into Europe has made an era in the history of agriculture.
There is nothing austere or sombre, as in northern climates, even in this scene of elemental strife; tranquillity and repose seem to sleep on the very edge of the abyss of waters. Neither time, nor the sight of the Cordilleras, nor a long abode in the charming valleys of Mexico, have been able to efface from my recollection the impression made by these cataracts.
Mountains are characteristically made up of distinct, more or less parallel ridges and valleys, which are grouped in very elongated belts, which, in the case of the American Cordilleras, extend from the Arctic to the Antarctic Circle.
No fire, but the fire of human blood in youthful veins, could ever be kept burning in these aerial solitudes. Fuel was rarely to be found, and kindling a secret hardly known except to Indians. However, our Kate can do everything, and she's the girl, if ever girl did such a thing, or ever girl did not such a thing, that I back at any odds for crossing the Cordilleras.
I do not hesitate to repeat, that neither time, nor the view of the Cordilleras, nor any abode in the temperate valleys of Mexico, has effaced from my mind the powerful impression of the aspect of the cataracts.
At the end of the year she sailed for Callao, the port of Lima, with the design of crossing the Andes, and pushing eastward, through the interior of South America, to the Brazilian coast. A revolution in Peru compelled her, however, to change her course, and she made her way to Ecuador, which served as a starting-point for her ascent of the Cordilleras.
Although the catastrophe was confined to the valley of the Tuy, the shocks were felt for many hundred miles in every direction, even as far as Barquesimeto and other places toward the Cordilleras.
The next day we reached the Paramo, on the summit of the Cordilleras, thirteen thousand feet above the level of the sea. We caught sight of numbers of wild asses, which inhabit this mountainous region. The hoof of the animal is divided like that of a pig. They are very shy, so that even the Indians are seldom able to approach near enough to kill them; and they are also very swift of foot.
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