THE PLAIN OF SANTIAGO: SCENERY; LAKE ACULEO; GEOLOGY AND BOTANY.-BREAKFAST ON THE LAKE SHORE.—ANGOSTURA The plain or basin in which lies Santiago varies little in aspect as one leaves the immediate vicinity of the city. As the cultivation is more directly confined to its sides, the vicinity of the main thoroughfare leading southward is somewhat desolate. This continues beyond the river Maypu, six leagues from the capital. The stream is traversed by a handsomely constructed lattice bridge, some 80 yards long, in two spans, the materials for which were brought from the United States, notwithstanding the immense forests of fine timber in the southern provinces. Its engineer was also a North American. At the time of this visit a large force was engaged along the road, digging water-drains at the sides, and heaping up the centre-proofs that a new order of things is progressing, and the day is perhaps not distant when the suspension bridges of lassos and canes made by the Araucanians, as well as the quagmires and bridlepaths over which their desperate forays were perpetrated, will remain only on the pages of the historian. Great as had been the fall of snow the preceding winter (June to August, 1850), and powerful as was the heat at the time (December), the stream was scarcely more imposing than the Mapocho; but its vertical banks were sufficient evidences that winter rain-storms sometimes swell it to a roaring volume, half a mile wide by fifteen to twenty feet in depth. Now, its breadth did not exceed thirty yards, with an average depth of three feet. Both above and below the bridge the main stream is divided into several smaller ones, separated from each other by piles or islands of shingle. These change with every flood; first to one side, next to the other; often in one rapid body, not unfrequently in many; each covering as great a superficial extent. To one accustomed to the broad and placid rivers of America, at a little distance these Chilean streams appear insignificant rivulets; but the volume of water which is daily discharged by the Mapocho exceeds that of the Potomac at Washington. In the aggregate the surfaces of the Mapocho's streams will not measure thirty yards across; the Potomac exceeds a mile; yet such is the effect of rapid inclination in carrying off the melted snows of the cordilleras. Prof. Domeyko's narrative of a journey to Araucania* distinctly conveys the impression that the Espino is the only indigenous tree found on the plain within fifty or sixty leagues of Santiago; yet the Patagua (Tricuspidaria dependens) and several others may be seen a little to the southward of the bridge, and in places wholly destitute of artificial irrigation. Fields of wheat, herds of cattle, and flocks of sheep, scattered about the bases of the distant hills, were picturesque accessories to the scene; those close by, as evidences of the fatness of the land, possess interest of a different character. Three or four leagues farther on, the haciendas are generally * Araucania y sus Habitantes, por Ignacio Domeyko. Santiago: 1846. of considerable extent, and are appreciated for the incomes their products afford, as well as for summer residences, when fashion commands its votaries to leave the capital. There are isolated, abrupt, and rugged hills scattered all over the bottom of the basin. From a miniature base sometimes they rear a lofty peak towards the skies; at others they cover miles with their gracefully curving outlines; and the distance between the Andes and western chain having sensibly widened as the southern rim has been approached, the only perceptible break in its mountain walls is where the Maypu with its increased volume of waters from the Mapocho and Angostura has burst a passage through the Central cordillera. There is no diminution of the glorious grandeur of the Andes, but rather accessions to it in the extinct volcanoes of Tupungato and San José, which are invisible to those residing immediately under the chain at Santiago. Leaving the main road, twelve or thirteen leagues from the city, a less frequented one strikes across limpid mountain streams running northwestwardly among spurs that spring from the western mountain ranges. Here the face of the country is most beautiful. One finds a rich alluvial soil, covered with profuse vegetation, now in its greatest luxuriance; roads shaded for miles on either side with Lombardy poplars; orchards, vineyards, bright flowers, and sparkling waters-all that nature can contribute to charm the sight! Would that man and his creations might do justice to them; or, at least, that his productions were not in such marked contrast! Pursuing the latter road something more than half a score of miles, the native woods become dense, and we find ourselves. surrounded by great trees covered with the thickest foliage, their branches bent towards the earth, so as to render the forest almost impenetrable. Nearly all of them were in flower; but the most attractive was the Patagua, the contrast of whose delicate white bell with the almost olive-color of its evergreen leaves being both striking and graceful. This is the Banyan tree of Chile; for wherever its branches touch the earth they take root, and new plants spring upwards, thus forming myriads of natural vegetable arches. A rivulet of clear water from the westward is the first intimation one has of a concealed gem in this mountain glen. The hills have gradually approached each other, and on both sides are from three thousand to six thousand feet away over head; whilst to the east and west, mountains of scarcely less elevation close it in. In the early morning light the Cereus quisco is seen on their grey summits, flinging its arms against the sky; and farther down their steep sides the ravines are filled with vegetation of various hues-contrasts relieving an otherwise arid aspect, unpleasant for the eye to dwell long upon. Crossing a slightly elevated promontory, there is spread out below, in pristine placidity, the mountain lake' of Aculeo-2 type of tranquillity. At early hours of the morning there is not a breath of air to ruffle its polished ice-formed waters; and they are disturbed only by wild fowl, whose ancestors alone possessed it. Before us, to the south and east, and also in one little spot to the westward, the bases of the hills slope off into plains, in some places perhaps a mile or more in width; but at every other point they descend precipitously, forming an elliptic, or, more properly speaking, an hour-glass shaped basin, two leagues in length by one in width at the water surface. Within the oblong bowl thus formed the storms of winter deposit rains, and melted snows trickle from the mountain sides. A part of this water finds outlet in the rivulet last mentioned, until the heats of summer reduce the level of the lake too low for further exit. Its greatest length is from east to west. Two promontories opposite each other divide it into basins of nearly equal superficial extent, connected by a short strait not above half a mile across. The western basin has a chain of islets from a few yards to an acre or two in extent, which are the haunts of vari-colored water-fowl. The geological formation differs on the two sides of the lake. One is sienitic, the other porphyritic, as are the hills northward of Santiago. As the disintegrated materials have been washed down during rains, the bed of the lake has filled, and there are now dead trees thirty or forty feet within the margin thus extended by the displacing materials. Was such the cause, or is the climate changing, and the retrogression of the shore-line due to an annually increasing quantity of rain? or has an earthquake uplifted its alluvial and less resisting bed, causing its waters to embrace so many Espinos within their bounds? No other tree was found within the lake, though the surrounding shores abound with Pataguas, Quillais (Quillaja obliqua), Peumo (Laurus p.), and Litres (L. venenosa), besides others of growth naturally smaller. The last named, as its botanic designation imports, is poisonous to the touch. In a brief time it transforms the body to a leprous-looking mass; and as we stood beneath the shadow of one admiring its pretty foliage and flowers, our guide, in alarm, called on us to mark our execration by spitting upon its decitful livery. According to popular belief, contact is not necessary for impregnation. Even some who sleep or stand long under its shadow are said to be affected, though others are wholly exempt from its poison. Its wood is of a dark reddish color, close-grained, and admitting of high polish-qualities which cause it to be greatly admired in the manufacture of cabinet furniture. At a rancho beside one of the paths we had given directions to prepare such a breakfast as may be obtained anywhere in Chile, and spent the two or three hours ensuing after sunrise in examining the landscape pictures presented from various points; approaching as closely as we could to the flocks of black-necked swans (C. nigricollis), scarlet-winged flamingos (P. ignipalliatus), and white herons (A. egretta and A. candidissima); rambling along the little patches of beach, to find a few perfect specimens of the only shell we perceived (a Planorbis); and in plucking here and there a cluster of brilliant flowers, until warned by the increasing intensity of the heat, and the cravings of hunger, that it was time to return towards our morning meal. Alternately riding and walking as a cluster of pretty plants seduced us from the horses,—now rambling along turfy sward, now picking a foot-hold among rocks of the mountain cliffs, we reached the rancho hot and tired. But the ponchos thrown off, and our heads bathed in the cool waters of the lake, new life was imparted, and we sat down to our "casuela" with appetites no little sharpened by a six hours' ramble. Except in Atacama, in every other part of Chile where there are habitations, the hungry traveller may count with great certainty on a substantial soup denominated a "casuela," composed of a fowl or part of a lamb cut in pieces, and simmered with an egg or two and various vegetables. All the ingredients are kept over fire in an earthen olla or pot for two or three hours, and are rendered no little piquant by a dash of aji (red Chile pepper), which the cook invariably adds. We had brought bread, a bottle of wine, and freshly-plucked oranges from the hacienda of our friend; and we amazingly enjoyed our breakfast under the trees, scarcely less objects of curiosity to the group of scantily clad children about the rancho door, than of interest to the half-starved dogs that prowled round us, eyeing each mouthful askance. These brutes are among the curses of the land. They infest its streets and highways, fill it with fleas and other vermin, render night hideous by their barkings, and are eyesores by day as well as nuisances at night. There being neither taxes on their owners nor law limiting their numbers even in the large cities, everybody possesses one or more; and as their usual sleeping-places are the sidewalks before the houses, it is difficult to walk without kicking them aside, or taking to the middle of the street. Families who have scarcely bread and no meat for their children, will keep half a dozen ugly curs; and in our ride towards the lake, there was one miserable rancho scarcely large enough to contain the dogs alone, from which there issued, as we approached, no less than thirteen, attended by half a score of children. After breakfast, we spread the skins forming part of our saddle equipments under the shadow of a cluster of Peumos, and, using the saddles as pillows, enjoyed both shelter and rest during the hottest part of the day. Around us rose a forest of venerable trees, varying little in the colors of their glossy foliage, and only in the form of the white or cream-colored flowers they bore. Farther off there were fantastic shaped rocks, unchanged since the instant when earth and chaos took leave of each other. At our feet there were Mariposas (Phycella ignea ?), Peregrinas (Alstræmeria peregrina), Calceolarias, and Siempre-vivas (Triptilion spinosum), with flowers of crimson, violet, golden, and purple hues,-a multitude not easily embraced at a glance in the . |