The 28th of January, 1849, found us on the Peruvian coast, abreast the Island of San Lorenzo, a mountain of sand, where not a blade of grass can vegetate; and rounding Galera Cape, we were shortly moored in the port of Callao.

The bay is a wide, sweeping indentation, with Lorenzo, Fronton, and a narrow spit of land jutting from the main, serving to keep the harbor smooth from prevailing southerly winds. To the north, the spurs of the Andes approach layer upon layer to the brink of the coast, while nearer the land trends away, towards the interior, nearly plain-like—green, fertile, and pleasant to gaze upon—with the clustering towers, and spires of Lima abutting on the distant hills.

There is no difference of opinion about Callao: for it is a filthy, bustling little port, reeking in garlic and drunken mariners, alive with fleas, miserable, dirty soldiers, and their yet more slovenly wives.

The place is thriving, for steam frequents it; and on the curving quay are piled mountains of English coals, enormous heaps of wheat, great stacks of pisco, and italia jars, where Haserac, the celebrated captain, might have concealed an army of thieves with impunity. Merchandise moves backwards and forwards on railway trucks, and lazy villains in pale yellow jackets, with iron chains and anklets attached to the legs, are at work after a fashion of their own.

The houses of the port are mean and irregular, built anywhere and any how, either of adobies, boards, and on the outskirts, pleasant cottage residences, built of bullocks' hides and poles. Streets and lanes run hither and thither, and glaring English signs stare you in the face, such as the "Jibboom House," "The Lively Pig," "Jackknife Corner," and "House of Blazes." Along the beach are ranges of wicker, reed, and mat-made sheds for bathing, which are thronged during the season. But the most prominent features of Callao that attract the eye, are the round, flat turrets of the Castle, flanked on either side by long lines of curtains, bastions, embrasures, and batteries. It covers a great space, enclosing within its thick and massive case-mated walls, ranges of barracks—now happily converted into warehouses for the customs—magazines, and a large square, with a fountain in the centre. The fortification, from the nature of its position, is somewhat irregular, constructed partly on a ridge of sand, leading towards the southern arm of the bay, where in former times was the site of old Callao, before its destruction by the memorable earthquake of 1746.

There is a wide, deep moat, like to the bed of a river, encircling the fortress, with narrow channels cut on either side to the sea. This is now dry and partially filled in nearest the town. The redoubts and detached outworks are also in ruins, but yet enough remains to make us reflect, that what the old Spanish engineers left incomplete in this work would hardly be worth attempting in our day.

It was here where the last stand of the Royalists was made in New Spain—where the bloodiest foot-prints were left since the days of the Incas and Pizarro—and it was in this same castle, where the brave Rodil, with a handful of devoted followers, clung to the soil of their royal master with a tenacity and determination amounting to heroism—where horse meat sold for a gold ounce the pound, and a chicken for its weight in the same precious metal: when, hemmed in on all sides, by sea and land—surrounded but not dismayed—they still kept their assailants at bay, until gaunt famine stalked before them, and they were forced to furl the well-worn colors of their King![7] A score of Rodils, and another century might have intervened before South American patriots could have wrested the continent from the old Spaniards.

If tired of contemplating these bloody reminiscences—or bathing under the sheds and awnings, where all resemble, in their saturated black frocks and trowsers, watery nuns; or if your temper is destroyed by the fleas, you can fly to the harbor, where are sturdy merchantmen reeking in guano, smoking steamers, and heavy ships of war—and thick fogs at night—or, what is more diverting, you may watch the motions of swarms of gulls that frequent the Port. Our good surgeon, who professed to be an ornithologist, called them platoon birds. They fly in regular battalions and divisions, in strict military apportionments—led and apparently commanded by their chieftains. The reviews generally began with fishing. At some understood, feathery signal, while sailing over the bay, they wheel like a flash, and strike the water simultaneously like a shower of bullets, and not with the eyes of Argus is it possible to detect the smallest irregularity in movement, nor a stray winged soldier out of the ranks.

However, all these amusements are, at best, dull recreation, and it is a great relief to get quit of Callao. Omnibii encumber the uttermost ends of the earth—so we go to the office, when the smiling administrador behind a railing exclaims, "Ah! Capitan! you want ascientos! Ah! you give me one Spanish dollar—ah! buÉno!" "Any thieves?" we timidly ask. "Ah, si, yes; but you give him gold ounce—no kill you, ah!" "Charming fellows, certainly; but suppose we give him an ounce of some other metal!" Ah! cuidado amigo!—have a care, my friend!

With five horses ahead, crack! crack! goes the thong of the negro Jehu—over the paved street, into the dusty road, where the plunging steeds are brought up floundering, tugging and straining the heavy vehicle axle, through the finely powdered soil—now firmly stalled, we get out per force, curse the roads, and threaten to whip the driver—then we come on harder ground, until imperceptibly there comes a rocky strata—loose stones, remains of adobie walls and ditches—but all equally execrable: then, for a mile or more, fine trees bend their towering arms over the road, and shortly after, we rattle through a huge gateway—have travelled eight miles, and we are in the city of kings—Lima! "See it and die," said the old land pirates of the days of its founder, Pizarro, and their descendants. Whatever it may have been two centuries ago, in these days it requires no very strong effort of will to survive the sight.

The city is compact and populous, the buildings are very low, and quite resemble the old Moriscan towns along the northern shores of Africa, with close overhanging jalousies and balconies, finely railed and latticed. The streets are wide and straight, paved with small pebbles—dreadfully torturing to the pedestrian—the side-walks beneath the portals or arcades of the plazas, and in the gateways and patios of dwellings are figured in coarse mosaic, formed by the white knuckle-bones of sheep and pebbles. Handsome shops fringe the fashionable avenues, glittering with costly fabrics and toys; then again packed side by side, in nooks, alcoves, and niches, are small merchants, who from their numbers, one would suppose to be all sellers and no buyers.

The little river Rimac flows noisily through the city, fed from far away by the silvered pinnacles of snows and ice in the lofty Andes. It is spanned by a substantial and lofty bridge, whose every stone has been loosened by the earthquake. Lima might be made one of the cleanest cities in the world; for through all the main arteries runs a narrow rivulet diverted from the Rimac. Nevertheless, it is excessively filthy, and the gallianzos, or vultures, tame, and pampered by a profusion of nastiness and offal, take their morning's meal in the streets and squares, and afterwards hobble to the house-tops, where, with blood-red eyes, and gorged bodies, they calmly endure repletion.

The most striking features upon approaching the city are the vast clusters of domes, towers, and spires, that arise in such thick profusion from the convents and churches, as to favor the belief that every house has something of the kind attached thereto. From the neighboring valley of Almencaes I have counted sixty. In the distance they present a solid, imposing aspect, but on a nearer view, they will generally be found mere paper structures of reeds and plaster. Many of the grand edifices, the cathedral, convents, and parochial churches, are partly of bricks, stone, or the most enormous adobies, up to the belfreys, but above, all are similar to the pasteboard decorations of the theatre; and although it seems reasonable to suppose they would topple down at the first summons of the tremblor, yet it is the only style of lofty work that will bear the frequent shocks, totter like a tree, and still stand erect. Externally these buildings are elaborately carved, painted, and imaged, without any consistent order of architecture; and within they are profusely decorated with rich gildings, paintings, and statues; all, however, destitute of taste; and only when brilliantly illuminated, with the myriads of silken parti-colored streamers pendant and fluttering from the lofty aisles, swinging censers, organs pealing, with all the pomp and imposing ceremony of the Catholic church, is the effect worthy of admiration.

The best position for viewing Lima—Asmodeus-like—is from the high tower of San Domingo, that is, if, after mounting above the bells, you can reconcile the flimsy quaking fabric you stand upon to any extreme ideas of personal safety. The devil on this pair of sticks could not have chosen a more eligible spot for inspecting the arcana of people's dwellings. The city is spread like a map at your feet; composed of long lines of crumbling walls, miles of flat roofs, and little patios, the former loosely tiled, and sprinkled over with dirt, where even dead cats, and tattered rags quietly repose for ages. There is not in the universe to be seen such a large area of mud walls, reed, and rush-built houses, all appearing so unfinished and incomplete. But in a climate where it never rains, where it never blows, where even the thick coatings of dust are hardly absorbed by the dry rain of winter fogs, it is not surprising that all these masses of reeds and plaster are preserved for centuries without perceptible decay. Still there can be no scepticism on one point, that if ever there chance to fall a heavy tropical shower, the city of Pizarro will be swept, a heap of mud and sticks, into the ocean.

Allowing the eyes to wander around and beyond the city, the discolored Rimac is seen hurrying from the melting bosom of its Alpine mother down between the distant hills, diffusing its fertilizing freshness over the sloping valley—the margins encircled by verdant fields of cane, like bright patches of emeralds, and the banks fringed by weeping willows, that dip their bending branches to kiss the rapid torrent. On it comes, over the stony bed, dashing its strength in fierce anger against the arches of the sturdy bridge, and then glancing by the flowering meads and slopes of Almencaes, flies rapidly to the placid waves of the Pacific.

[7] In February, 1826.