. Pacific shores from Panama . to the Royal Cordillera upon the one hand and toan unlimited distance upon the other. Long trainsof little donkeys, heavily laden, watched by theirarrieros, and great majadas of llamas, each with itshundred-pound load, were coming from every direc-tion across the plains, and all were trending towarda certain focal point ahead of us. But where couldthe city be? The train whistled as it rounded a long curve, andsuddenly, without warning, at the side of the tracka great chasm opened, coming with such abruptness,so unexpectedly, that, breathless, we grasped somefirm
. Pacific shores from Panama . to the Royal Cordillera upon the one hand and toan unlimited distance upon the other. Long trainsof little donkeys, heavily laden, watched by theirarrieros, and great majadas of llamas, each with itshundred-pound load, were coming from every direc-tion across the plains, and all were trending towarda certain focal point ahead of us. But where couldthe city be? The train whistled as it rounded a long curve, andsuddenly, without warning, at the side of the tracka great chasm opened, coming with such abruptness,so unexpectedly, that, breathless, we grasped somefirm object for support. At its far extremity Illimani, hghtly wreathed withclouds, raised its glorious summit, gleaming in allthe splendour of its dazzling snow-fields. To the leftHuayna Potosi spread its glittering peaks and, cutinto the flanks of these two giants of the Andes,seamed and scarred by glacial torrents, deeplyeroded, mined by cataracts and rivers, this profoundvalley has been excavated by the primeval forces of [214]. «3KSfc~-J;--as»Si^a». A Llama Train on flic Ilolininn JJighlands A GLIMPSE OF BOLIVIA nature. At its bottom, far below us, fifteen hundredfeet or more, lay the city of Our Lady of Peace, LaPaz, from whose slate roofs and towers a pale-bluevapour seemed to emanate as if it were offering in-cense at the shrine of some great god. And fittingly,for were not these two mountains, Illimani andHuayna Potosi, the Indians Olympus, the abode ofhis chief deities! Along the precipitous walls of this abyss, whitefillets of road cut zig-zags and loops, along which wecould make out the donkey-trains and llamas withtheir horsemen and drivers crawling slowly down-ward like strings of ants. Our steam-driven engine was now changed to onerun by electricity, and our train plunged over thebrink. The upper plains vanished. Steep wallsgradually rose about us. The houses of the city ateach turn lifted themselves nearer, and in twenty min-utes we were at the station of the Bohv
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