the Cordilleras (the Cerro Puerto and the Questa de Zapata), it resembles considerably the Simplon Pass. The road is very much traveled-every moment we met carriages, mules, donkeys and horses loaded with merchandise, and enormous wagons, often in trains of six, eight or ten, each drawn by five or six yoke of oxen, and of the rudest construction imaginable: the wheels making a deafening uproar, like the gates to Milton's Pandemonium - because the Chilean freighters say that " this racket does the oxen for music," and consequently they neglect the use. of grease and tar. The yokes are as rude and heavy in proportion as the carts: and for harness they have only cords made of raw hide, strongly braided. Each cart has at least three teamsters. One sits in the wagon, armed with a long pole or whip, and from time to time he makes use of a bamboo, some thirty feet in length, to accelerate the gait of the front pair of oxen. The second sits on the yoke, between the heads of the second pair of oxen, likewise armed with a stick. There was something ridiculous in the appearance and attitude of the latter, with naked muscular legs dangling in the air, sitting only on a folded sheepskin, and still with happiness and contentment imprinted on his tanned face; happier no doubt, between the four horns of his two oxen, than many a rich man in the midst of opulence. The third rides a horse, whip in hand, and does nothing but pass and repass from one side to the other. If such a combination should pass through your streets, in its slow and solemn movement and with its prolonged, harmonious, ear-splitting creaking, I don't doubt that all the inhabitants would be sticking their noses out at the doors and that the team from Chile would attract as much attention as a dancing bear or a dozen elephants.
The Casa Blanca valley, which we traversed, is three or four leagues wide. We lodged in a little village called Cura-cavi. On leaving Valparaiso the road rises, winding along the mountain side for about an hour, until it comes out on a very extensive and lofty plain, from which there