The Indians maintain that Coca is the best preventive of that difficulty of respiration felt in the rapid ascents of the Cordilleras and the Puna. “Of this fact,” says Von Tschudi,[11] “I was fully convinced by my own experience. I speak here, not of the mastication of the leaves, but of their decoction taken as a beverage.”
“When I was in the Puna, at the height of fourteen thousand feet above the level of the sea, I drank always before going out to hunt, a strong infusion of Coca leaves. I could then, during the whole day, climb the heights and follow the swift-footed wild animals, without experiencing any greater difficulty of breathing than I should have felt in similar rapid movements on the coast. Moreover, I did not suffer from the symptoms of cerebral excitement or uneasiness which other travellers have experienced. The reason, perhaps, is, that I only drank the decoction on the cold Puna, where the nervous system is far less susceptible than in the climate of the forests beneath. However, I always felt a sense of great satiety after taking the Coca infusion, and I did not feel a desire for my next meal until after the time at which I usually took it.”
He also says:—
“A cholo of Huarai, named Hatan Huamang, was employed by me in very laborious digging. During the five days and nights he was in my service he never tasted any food, and took only two hours’ sleep each night. But at intervals of two and a half or three hours he regularly chewed about half an ounce of Coca leaves, and he kept an acullico continually in his mouth. I was constantly beside him, and therefore I had the opportunity of closely observing him. The work for which I engaged him being finished, he accompanied me on a two days’ journey of twenty-three leagues across the level heights. Though on foot, he kept up with the pace of my mule, and halted only for the chacchar. On leaving me, he declared he would willingly engage himself again for the same amount of work, and that he would go through it without food, if I would but allow him a sufficient supply of coca. The village priest assured me that this man was sixty-two years of age, and that he had never known him to be ill in his life.”
In this account we cannot but conclude that the traveller’s credulity was imposed on. He further adds:—
“Setting aside all extravagant and visionary notions on the subject, I am clearly of opinion that the moderate use of Coca is not merely innoxious, but that it may even be very conducive to health.”
He instances cases “by no means singular,” of longevity among the Indians of individuals who had attained the great age of 130 years, under its use.
Pöppig[12] says the average yield of a Cocal or Coca plantation is about 800 lbs. of dry leaves per English acre. When nearly dry, he says, they emit an odour similar to mellilot, or the new-mown hay odour of Anthoxanthum odoratum (probably due to coumarin), which causes headache to strangers. If not perfectly dry when packed they heat and ferment, and become inert and useless, especially to the manufacturer of Cocaine.
Both Pöppig and Von Tschudi give a doleful account of the intemperate use of Coca by the inveterate coquero, as he is called,—his bad breath, pale lips and gums, greenish and stumpy teeth, and an ugly black mark at the angles of his mouth, his unsteady gait, yellow skin, dim and sunken eyes encircled by a purple ring, his quivering lips, and his general apathy—all bear evidence of the baneful effects of the Coca when taken in excess. He prefers solitude, and, when a slave to his cravings, he will often take himself for days together to the silence of the woods to indulge unrestrained the use of the leaf. The habit must be very seducing, as, though long stigmatised and very generally considered as a degrading, purely Indian vice, many white Peruvians at Lima and elsewhere retire daily at stated times to chew Coca. Even Europeans, Von Tschudi says, have fallen into the habit. Both he and Pöppig mention instances of white coqueros of good Peruvian families who were addicted to the vice. One is described by Pöppig who became averse to any exertion; city life and its restraints were hateful to him; he lived in a miserable hut; once a month, at least, when irresistibly seized with the passion he would disappear into the forest and be lost for many days, after which he would emerge sick, powerless, and altered.
“He was of use to me,” he says, “as a good and eager sportsman, and by liberally supplying him with such fine gunpowder as he could not obtain by purchase, I soon gained his perfect confidence and goodwill. His disposition was generally kind, but any remonstrance against his vice would throw him into an ungovernable rage. He has frequently assured me in confidential moments that he would rather, as he has done for months together, live alone in the midst of some Coca shrubs in the most solitary spot in the wilderness, depending for support on his fishing-line and gun than return home to his family at Huanuco. His description of the lovely visions that appeared to him in the forest at night, and of his delicious sensation at such moments, had in it something truly awful. When it rained he used to cover his half-naked body with the soddened leaves that had fallen from the trees, and he assured me that when this wretched substitute for raiment was brought to steam by the warmth of his person, that he could lie thus enveloped for hours without experiencing inconvenience or cold.”