Only at long intervals a group of points or a single cone showed
where a volcano had existed, or does now exist. Hence the range
resembled a great solid wall, surmounted here and there by a tower,
and making a most perfect barrier to the country.
Almost every part of the hill had been drilled by attempts to open
gold-mines: the rage for mining has left scarcely a spot in Chile
unexamined. I spent the evening as before, talking round the fire
with my two companions. The Guasos of Chile, who correspond to the
Gauchos of the Pampas, are, however, a very different set of
beings. Chile is the more civilised of the two countries, and the
inhabitants, in consequence, have lost much individual character.
Gradations in rank are much more strongly marked: the Guaso does
not by any means consider every man his equal; and I was quite
surprised to find that my companions did not like to eat at the
same time with myself. This feeling of inequality is a necessary
consequence of the existence of an aristocracy of wealth. It is
said that some few of the greater landowners possess from five to
ten thousand pounds sterling per annum: an inequality of riches
which I believe is not met with in any of the cattle-breeding
countries eastward of the Andes.
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