A caution is necessary however. It is a pity that we use the term “revolution” to designate these little disturbances. They affect sometimes a few, again a few hundred men. Rarely do they involve the whole country. A good many of them are on a scale much smaller than our big strikes. Most of them involve a loss of life smaller than that which accompanies a city riot. They are in a sense strikes against the government, marked by local disorders and a little violence.
Early in 1911 the Prefect of the Department of Abancay had crowned his long career by suppressing a revolution. He had been Subprefect at Andahuaylas, and when the rebels got control of the city of Abancay and destroyed some of the bridges on the principal trails, he promptly organized a military expedition, constructed rafts, floated his small force of men across the streams, and besieged the city. The rebel force was driven at last to take shelter in the city jail opposite the Prefectura. There, after the loss of half their number, they finally surrendered. Seventy-five of them were sent to the government penitentiary at Arequipa. Among the killed were sons from nearly half the best families of Abancay. All of the rebels were young men.
It would be difficult to give an adequate idea of the hatred felt by the townspeople toward the government. Every precaution was taken to prevent a renewal of the outbreak. Our coming was telegraphed ahead by government agents who looked with suspicion upon a party of men, well armed and provisioned, coming up from the Pasaje crossing of the Apurimac, three days’ journey north. The deep canyon affords shelter not only to game, but also to fugitives, rebels, and bandits. The government generally abandons pursuit on the upper edge of the canyon, for only a prolonged guerilla warfare could completely subdue an armed force scattered along its rugged walls and narrow floor. The owner of the hacienda at Pasaje is required to keep a record of all passengers rafted across the Apurimac, but he explains significantly that some who pass are too hurried to write their names in his book. Once he reaches the eastern wall of the canyon a fugitive may command a view of the entire western wall and note the approach of pursuers. Thence eastward he has the whole Cordillera Vilcapampa in which to hide. Pursuit is out of the question.
When we arrived, the venerable Prefect, a model of old-fashioned courtesy, greeted us with the utmost cordiality. He told us of our movements since leaving Pasaje, and laughingly explained that since we had sent him no friendly message and had come from a rebel retreat, he had taken it for granted that we intended to storm the town. I assured him that we were ready to join his troops, if necessary, whereupon, with a delightful frankness, he explained his method of keeping the situation in hand. Several troops of cavalry and two battalions of infantry were quartered at the government barracks. Every evening the old gentleman, a Colonel in the Peruvian army, mounted a powerful gray horse and rode, quite unattended, through the principal streets of the town. Several times I walked on foot behind him, again I preceded him, stopping in shops on the way to make trivial purchases, to find out what the people had to say about him and the government as he rode by. One old gentleman interested me particularly. He had only the day before called at the Prefectura to pay his respects. Although his manner was correct there was lacking to a noticeable degree the profusion of sentiment that is apt to be exhibited on such an occasion. He now sat on a bench in a shop. Both his own son and the shopkeeper’s son had been slain in the revolution. It was natural that they should be bitter. But the precise nature of their complaint was what interested me most. One said that he did not object to having his son lose his life for his country. But that his country’s officials should hire Indians to shoot his son seemed to him sheer murder. Later, at Lambrama, I talked with a rebel fugitive, and that was also his complaint. The young men drafted into the army are Indians, or mixed, never whites. White men, and men with a small amount of Indian blood, officer the army. When a revolutionary party organizes it is of course made up wholly of men of white and mixed blood, never Indians. The Indians have no more grievance against one white party than another. Both exploit him to the limit of law and beyond the limit of decency. He fights if he must, but never by choice.
| Fig. 56—The type of forest in the moister tracts of the valley floor at Sahuayaco. In the center of the photograph is a tree known as the “sandy matico” used in making canoes for river navigation. | Fig. 57—Arboreal cacti in the mixed forest of the dry valley floor below Sahuayaco. |