quantities along the coast,-was planted with some kind of grain or vegetable."3

The Peruvian farmers were well acquainted with the different kinds of manures, and made large use of them; a circumstance rare in the rich lands of the tropics, and probably not elsewhere practised by the rude tribes of America. They made great use of guano, the valuable deposit of sea-fowl, that has attracted so much attention of late from the agriculturists both of Europe and of our own country, and the stimulating and nutritious properties of which the Indians perfectly appreciated. This was found in such immense quantities on many of the little islands along the coast as to have the appearance of lofty hills, which, covered with a white saline incrustation, led the Conquerors to give them the name of the sierra nevada, or "snowy mountains."

The Incas took their usual precautions for securing the benefits of this important article to the husbandman. They assigned the small islands on the coast to the use of the respective districts which lay adjacent to them. When the island was large, it was distributed among several districts, and the boundaries for each were clearly defined. All encroachment on the rights of another was severely punished. And they secured the preservation of the fowl by penalties as stern as those by which the Norman tyrants of England protected their own game. No one was allowed to set

3 Cieza de Leon, Cronica, cap. 73.-The remains of these ancient excavations still excite the wonder of the modern traveller. See Stevenson, Residence in South America, vol. i. p. 359.—Also McCulloh, Researches, p. 358.

foot on the island during the season for breeding, under pain of death; and to kill the birds at any time was punished in the like manner."4

With this advancement in agricultural science, the Peruvians might be supposed to have had some knowledge of the plough, in such general use among the primitive nations of the Eastern continent. But they had neither the iron ploughshare of the Old World, nor had they animals for draught, which, indeed, were nowhere found in the New. The instrument which they used was a strong, sharp-pointed stake, traversed by a horizontal piece, ten or twelve inches from the point, on which the ploughman might set his foot and force it into the ground. Six or eight strong men were attached by ropes to the stake, and dragged it forcibly along, pulling together, and keeping time as they moved by chanting their national songs, in which they were accompanied by the women who followed in their train, to break up the sods with their rakes. The mellow soil offered slight resistance; and the laborer, by long practice, acquired a dexterity which enabled him to turn up the ground to the requisite depth with astonishing facility. This substitute for the plough was but a clumsy contrivance; yet it is curious as the only specimen of the kind among the American aborigines, and was perhaps not much inferior to the wooden instrument introduced in its stead by the European conquerors."

It was frequently the policy of the Incas, after pro

24 Acosta, lib. 4, cap. 36.-Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 5

cap. 3.

25 Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 5, cap. 2.

viding a deserted tract with the means for irrigation and thus fitting it for the labors of the husbandman, to transplant there a colony of mitimaes, who brought it under cultivation by raising the crops best suited to the soil. While the peculiar character and capacity of the lands were thus consulted, a means of exchange of the different products was afforded to the neighboring provinces, which, from the formation of the coun try, varied much more than usual within the same limits. To facilitate these agricultural exchanges, fairs were instituted, which took place three times a month in some of the most populous places, where, as money was unknown, a rude kind of commerce was kept up by the barter of their respective products. These fairs afforded so many holidays for the relaxation of the industrious laborer.

26

Such were the expedients adopted by the Incas for the improvement of their territory; and, although imperfect, they must be allowed to show an acquaintance with the principles of agricultural science that gives them some claim to the rank of a civilized people. Under their patient and discriminating culture, every inch of good soil was tasked to its greatest power of production; while the most unpromising spots were compelled to contribute something to the subsistence of the people. Everywhere the land teemed with evidence of agricultural wealth, from the smiling valleys along the coast to the terraced steeps of the sierra, which, rising into pyramids of verdure, glowed with all the splendors of tropical vegetation.

20 Sarmiento, Rel., MS., cap. 19.-Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 6, cap. 36; lib. 7, cap. 1.-Herrera, Hist. gen., dec. 5, lib. 4, cap. 3

The formation of the country was particularly favorable, as already remarked, to an infinite variety of products, not so much from its extent as from its various elevations, which, more remarkable even than those in Mexico, comprehend every degree of latitude from the equator to the polar regions. Yet, though the temperature changes in this region with the degree of elevation, it remains nearly the same in the same spots throughout the year; and the inhabitant feels none of those grateful vicissitudes of season which belong to the temperate latitudes of the globe.. Thus, while the summer lies in full power on the burning regions of the palm and the cocoa-tree that fringe the borders of the ocean, the broad surface of the table-land blooms with the freshness of perpetual spring, and the higher summits of the Cordilleras are white with everlasting winter.

The Peruvians turned this fixed variety of climate, if I may so say, to the best account, by cultivating the productions appropriate to each; and they particularly directed their attention to those which afforded the most nutriment to man. Thus, in the lower level were to be found the cassava-tree and the banana, that bountiful plant, which seems to have relieved man from the primeval curse-if it were not rather a blessing-of toiling for his sustenance." As the banana

27 The prolific properties of the banana are shown by M. de Humboldt, who states that its productiveness, as compared with that of wheat, is as 133 to 1, and with that of the potato, as 44 to I. (Essai politique sur le Royaume de la Nouvelle-Espagne, Paris, 1827, tom. ii. p. 389.) It is a mistake to suppose that this plant was not indigenous to South America. The banana-leaf has been frequently found in ancient Peruvian tombs.

faded from the landscape, a good substitute was found in the maize, the great agricultural staple of both the northern and southern divisions of the American continent, and which, after its exportation to the Old World, spread so rapidly there as to suggest the idea of its being indigenous to it. 28 The Peruvians were well acquainted with the different modes of preparing this useful vegetable, though it seems they did not use it for bread, except at festivals; and they extracted a sort of honey from the stalk, and made an intoxicating liquor from the fermented grain, to which, like the Aztecs, they were immoderately addicted."9

The temperate climate of the table-land furnished them with the maguey, agave Americana, many of the extraordinary qualities of which they comprehended, though not its most important one of affording a material for paper. Tobacco, too, was among the products of this elevated region. Yet the Peruvians ditfered from every other Indian nation to whom it was known, by using it only for medicinal purposes, in the form of snuff.30 They may have found a substitute for

28 The misnomer of blé de Turquie shows the popular error. Yet the rapidity of its diffusion through Europe and Asia after the discovery of America is of itself sufficient to show that it could not have been indigenous to the Old World and have so long remained generally unknown there.

29 Acosta, lib. 4, cap. 16.—The saccharine matter contained in the maize-stalk is much greater in tropical countries than in more northern iatitudes; so that the natives in the former may be seen sometimes sucking it like the sugar-cane. One kind of the fermented liquors. sora, made from the corn, was of such strength that the use of it was forbidden by the Incas, at least to the common people. Their injunctions do not seem to have been obeyed so implicitly in this instance as usual.

30 Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 2, cap. 25.