Steep barren hills rise
like islands from the plain, which is divided, by straight
mud-walls, into large green fields. In these scarcely a tree grows
excepting a few willows, and an occasional clump of bananas and of
oranges. The city of Lima is now in a wretched state of decay: the
streets are nearly unpaved; and heaps of filth are piled up in all
directions, where the black gallinazos, tame as poultry, pick up
bits of carrion. The houses have generally an upper story, built,
on account of the earthquakes, of plastered woodwork; but some of
the old ones, which are now used by several families, are immensely
large, and would rival in suites of apartments the most magnificent
in any place. Lima, the City of the Kings, must formerly have been
a splendid town. The extraordinary number of churches gives it,
even at the present day, a peculiar and striking character,
especially when viewed from a short distance.
One day I went out with some merchants to hunt in the immediate
vicinity of the city. Our sport was very poor; but I had an
opportunity of seeing the ruins of one of the ancient Indian
villages, with its mound like a natural hill in the centre. The
remains of houses, enclosures, irrigating streams, and burial
mounds, scattered over this plain, cannot fail to give one a high
idea of the condition and number of the ancient population.
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