Peru as It Is, Volume 2 (of 2) / A Residence in Lima, and Other Parts of the Peruvian Republic, Comprising an Account of the Social and Physical Features of That Country

by Archibald Smith

Under this vulgar but satisfactory and long-established treatment of cholera morbus in Lima, where the disease is endemic, though more prevalent in the hot months, vomiting, hiccup, and cramps disappear; reaction is so mild and favourable as never to require the lancet: yet recovery is almost always certain, though cases appear from time to time so intense as to assume the aspect of what is called Asiatic cholera, during which, as a native physician expresses it, the patient is a horrid image of death.

At Ica and various other points to the southward, where vineyards abound, it is observed in vintage-time that to eat freely of the grape on an empty stomach, or without eating bread with the fruit, is one of the most frequent causes of dysentery, which disease is more appalling and fatal on the shores of the Pacific than the cholera morbus to which we have just alluded. It is, however, gratifying to know that, in the form of dysentery which commonly prevails, the calomel and opium plan of treatment, when discreetly conducted, is assuredly the safest and best yet adopted, whether in Lima or in the interior of the country.

Moquegua, which lies a considerable way inwards towards the mountains behind the sea-port of Ilo, is not less famous for its wine and its grapes, than for its dysenteries and violent agues; but Tacna, on the other hand, about seven leagues inward from the port of Arica, is so healthy as to be a place of resort to the people of the port during the terciana, or aguish season, which, over all the coast, is about the vernal and more particularly the autumnal equinox.

The salubrity of climate for which Tacna is distinguished is considered to be partly owing to its vicinity to the cold of the mountains, (for the snowy pass of the Cordillera, which leads to upper Peru, is within four hours’ ride of this town,) and still more to a fine dry plain between it and the sea, which only wants water to become rich in agricultural produce.[33] But in its present state it is free from that malaria which the humidity attendant on irrigation would not fail to engender here as well as in other parts of the coast. In its environs cotton grows spontaneously; and the native women collect it, and make thread from it by means of the spindle, just as we have often seen done in some of the warmer inland valleys, where the cotton is indigenous. It is a fact, not perhaps undeserving of notice, that a bud cut off a cotton-tree in the neighbourhood of Arica or Tacna was hung up in the cabin of an English merchant-ship, preserved its vitality in the navigation round Cape Horn, and opened when about half-way between Peru and England.

The whole coast of upper Peru—now called Bolivia—is arid and desert; so much so, that the celebrated president Santa Cruz—who, much to the prejudice of Arica,[34] made Cobija a free port for the introduction of merchandise,—found that he could not, by sinking pits in the deep sands of Cobija, come at a supply of good water.[35] For want of water and lucern, mules from the interior of Bolivia often die at the sea-port of Cobija; for there is no vegetation within a great distance from this place. The little water that is obtained at Cobija is brackish, like that in the pozo or well of the great castle at Callao,[36] which has invariably been observed to give disorder of the bowels to the soldiers, who, during the sieges which that fortress has sustained, were obliged to drink of it. The same has been observed at Cobija, and therefore there are boats kept there for the purpose of conveying water to it from Paquisa and other distant parts, which makes it an expensive necessary of life.

On several parts of the coast of Peru, water, even for domestic uses, is very scarce; and in the dry season wells are often dug in the beds of dried-up rivers, or in other places in the neighbourhood of irrigated lands. At Port Bermejo and Casma, between nine and ten degrees of south latitude, we are told by the Spanish coasting pilots that, dig where you will, at ten or twelve paces from the sea, you are sure of finding water at the depth of half a fathom that is not very brackish. Wells or pits, however, thus opened in different parts of the coast, are often found to dry up as they do in Lima (where they are common enough) during the dry season, which is the time when they are most required.

In northern Peru the practice of digging pits for water in the beds of rivers is very common; and such is the scarcity of fresh water at the sea-port of Payta, that it is carried to the city on mules, from the distance of several leagues. But on the contrary, at the sea-port of Arica, in southern Peru, good water is found wherever a pit is dug for it; and within two leagues of this port is the fine vale of Asapa, abounding in vines, olives, lucern, corn, &c. and affording a more convenient and copious supply of fresh provisions for shipping than either Payta or Cobija. These facts are of value not only in an economical but medical point of view; since on the quality of the water, as well as of the condition of the atmosphere, in any particular situation, must greatly depend the health of its inhabitants. Thus, in Arequipa, of which Quilca was the old, and Islay the present sea-port, the river-water is said to contain some salts in solution, which render it unwholesome until it is boiled; and this is known to be one of the causes of dysentery, which is a prevalent disease in that city.

The peasantry, who travel with asses between Bolivia and Chile across the deserts of Atacama, pitch their tents by day, to avoid the extreme heat of the sun reflected from the burning sand, and proceed on their journey by night; carrying with them all the water and provisions necessary for the journey. And it may be remarked that the soldiers, sent by order of General Salaverry to invade Cobija, had to march from the landing-place at Iquique over desert sands like these, when under their gallant leader Quirroga they took by surprise the port of Bolivia. These coast marches usually fall to the lot of the Indian infantry, and these hardy natives of the mountains generally prefer performing them between sun-down and sun-rise; for not being constituted, like the sable races, to live in very warm climates, they are more liable to fever when posting over sandy plains during the noon-tide heat; and, if they do but meet with musk or water-melons on their way, they devour them so greedily that they are sure to fall victims to sundry disorders—as intermittents, remittents, dysentery, &c.

In Chile, Nature puts on a different appearance from what she wears in Peru and Bolivia; there, however, as in these countries, the year is divided into wet and dry—the winter and summer. But in Chile it rains, as in Colombia and the Equatorial Republic, at the same season on the mountains and coast; in which respect it differs altogether from Peru and Bolivia. In the southern extremity of this republic, at about 40° of south latitude, the rains are heavier, and of longer continuance, than in the northernmost part, where it joins the great desert of Atacama. On the coast of Chile very severe gales are experienced, when the coast of Peru is only refreshed by light and gentle breezes.