While the fire was at its height I went into the adjoining building to see whether any help could be rendered. To my utter amazement the surface of the wall next to the fiery furnace was not even warm. Such is the result of building houses with massive walls of stone. Furthermore, the roofs in Arequipa are of tiles; consequently no harm was done by sparks. So, without a fire department, this really terrible fire was limited to one warehouse! The next day the newspapers talked about the “dire necessity” of securing fire engines. It was difficult for me to see what good a fire engine could have done. Nothing could have saved the warehouse itself once the fire got under way; and surely the houses next door would have suffered more had they been deluged with streams of water. The facts are almost incredible to an American. We take it as a matter of Page 97course that cities should have fires and explosions. In Arequipa everybody thought it was an earthquake!
A day's run by an excellent railroad takes one to Puno, the chief port of Lake Titicaca, elevation 12,500 feet. Puno boasts a soldier's monument and a new theater, really a “movie palace.” There is a good harbor, although dredging is necessary to provide for steamers like the Inca. Repairs to the lake boats are made on a marine—or, rather, a lacustrine—railway. The bay of Puno grows quantities of totoras, giant bulrushes sometimes twelve feet long. Ages ago the lake dwellers learned to dry the totoras, tie them securely in long bundles, fasten the bundles together, turn up the ends, fix smaller bundles along the sides as a free-board, and so construct a fishing-boat, or balsa. Of course the balsas eventually become water-logged and spend a large part of their existence on the shore, drying in the sun. Even so, they are not very buoyant. I can testify that it is difficult to use them without getting one's shoes wet. As a matter of fact one should go barefooted, or wear sandals, as the natives do.
The balsas are clumsy, and difficult to paddle. The favorite method of locomotion is to pole or, when the wind favors, sail. The mast is an A-shaped contraption, twelve feet high, made of two light poles tied together and fastened, one to each side of the craft, slightly forward of amidships. Poles are extremely scarce in this region—lumber has to be brought from Puget Sound, 6000 miles away—so Page 98nearly all the masts I saw were made of small pieces of wood spliced two or three times. To the apex of the “A” is attached a forked stick, over which run the halyards. The rectangular “sail” is nothing more nor less than a large mat made of rushes. A short forestay fastened to the sides of the “A” about four feet above the hull prevents the mast from falling when the sail is hoisted. The main halyards take the place of a backstay. The balsas cannot beat to windward, but behave very well in shallow water with a favoring breeze. When the wind is contrary the boatmen must pole. They are extremely careful not to fall overboard, for the water in the lake is cold, 55° F., and none of them know how to swim. Lake Titicaca itself never freezes over, although during the winter ice forms at night on the shallow bays and near the shore.
A Lake Titicaca Balsa at Puno
A Step-Topped Niche on the Island of Koati
When the Indians wish to go in the shallowest waters they use a very small balsa not over eight feet long, barely capable of supporting the weight of one man. On the other hand, large balsas constructed for use in crossing the rough waters of the deeper portions of the lake are capable of carrying a dozen people and their luggage. Once I saw a ploughman and his team of oxen being ferried across the lake on a bulrush raft. To give greater security two balsas are sometimes fastened together in the fashion of a double canoe.
One of the more highly speculative of the Bolivian writers, Señor Posnansky, of La Paz, believes that gigantic balsas were used in bringing ten-ton monoliths across the lake to Tiahuanaco. This theory Page 99is based on the assumption that Titicaca was once very much higher than it is now, a hypothesis which has not commended itself to modern geologists or geographers. Dr. Isaiah Bowman and Professor Herbert Gregory, who have studied its geology and physiography, have not been able to find any direct evidence of former high levels for Lake Titicaca, or of its having been connected with the ocean.
Nevertheless, Señor Posnansky believes that Lake Titicaca was once a salt sea which became separated from the ocean as the Andes rose. The fact that the lake fishes are fresh-water, rather than marine, forms does not bother him. Señor Posnansky pins his faith to a small dried seahorse once given him by a Titicaca fisherman. He seems to forget that dried specimens of marine life, including starfish, are frequently offered for sale in the Andes by the dealers in primitive medicines who may be found in almost every market-place. Probably Señor Posnansky's seahorse was brought from the ocean by some particularly enterprising trader. Although starfish are common enough in the Andes and a seahorse has actually found its resting-place in La Paz, this does not alter the fact that scientific investigators have never found any strictly marine fauna in Lake Titicaca. On the other hand, it has two or three kinds of edible fresh-water fish. One of them belongs to a species found in the Rimac River near Lima. It seems to me entirely possible that the Incas, with their scorn of the difficulties of carrying heavy burdens over seemingly impossible trails, might have deliberately transplanted the desirable Page 100fresh-water fishes of the Rimac River to Lake Titicaca.