A BOLIVIAN WOMAN.
Bolivia has been called the cradle of civilisation, and long before the Incas in the neighbouring State of Peru founded their kingdom it was inhabited by a cultivated race, who have left behind monuments of their skill in the shape of statues and buildings strongly wrought of carved stone. Whatever the warlike prowess of this primitive folk may have been, it was not sufficiently developed to resist the invasion of the Incas, and when the Spaniards, under the redoubtable Pizarro, entered the country, they found it under the domination of the latter race.
Bolivia may also make the unique boast that on its soil was struck the last blow for South American independence. The victory of Ayacusho, achieved in December, 1824, proved the death-blow to Spanish domination in the sub-continent, and it is therefore a landmark not only in the history of South America, but of the world.
SAILING ON LAKE TITICACA.
Bolivia may also be proud—if nations should be proud of such things—that she has had more revolutions than any other State even in that part of the globe where revolutions are a favourite pastime.
The Bolivians resemble a certain king in one of Browning’s poems, they have favourites manifold, and shift their ministry
BALSAS ON LAKE TITICACA.