These regions, so favored by nature, have from the earliest period been the chosen dwelling-places of the Peruvians; and therefore in the Sierra, which, measured by its superficies, is not of very great extent, the population has increased more than in any other part of Peru. The valleys already contain numerous towns, villages, and hamlets, which would rise in importance, if they had greater facility of communication one with another. But they are surrounded on all sides by mountains, which can be crossed only by circuitous and dangerous routes. The few accessible pathways are alternately up rugged ascents, and down steep declivities; or winding through narrow ravines, nearly choked up by broken fragments of rock, they lead to the dreary and barren level heights.
The Serranos, or inhabitants of the Sierra, especially those who dwell in the smaller villages, are chiefly Indians. In the towns and larger villages, the mestizos are numerous. The whites are very thinly scattered over the Sierra; but many of the mestizos are very anxious to be thought white Creoles. A rich serrano, who bears in his features the stamp of his Indian descent, will frequently try to pass himself off to a foreigner for an old Spaniard. Here, even more than on the coast, the mestizo is ambitious to rank himself on a level with the white, whilst he affects to regard the Indian as an inferior being.
The few Spaniards who reside in the Sierra are men who have served in the Spanish army, and who, at the close of the war of independence, settled in that part of Peru. Many of them keep shops in the towns and villages, and others, by advantageous marriages, have become the possessors of haciendas. Those who have enriched themselves in this way are remarkable alike for ignorance and pride, and give themselves the most ludicrous airs of assumed dignity. The Creoles are the principal dealers in articles of European commerce. They journey to Lima twice or thrice a year to make their purchases, which consist in white and printed calicoes, woollen cloths, hard-wares, leather, soap, wax, and indigo. In the Sierra, indigo is a very considerable article of traffic: the Indians use a great quantity of it for dyeing their clothes; blue being their favorite color. Wax is also in great demand; for in the religious ceremonies, which are almost of daily occurrence, a vast quantity of tapers is consumed. The principal articles of traffic produced by the natives are woollen ponchos and blankets, unspun colored wool, saddle-cloths, stirrups and horseshoes. The last-named articles are purchased chiefly by the arrieros of the coast. It may seem strange that stores of horseshoes should be kept ready made; but so it is; for though in Europe we make the shoe to fit the hoof, yet in Peru it is the practice to cut the hoof to fit the shoe. On Yca brandy more money is expended than on every other article of trade combined. The quantity of that spirit annually transported to the Sierra exceeds belief. To see the Indians on Sundays and festival days thronging to the shops of the spirit dealers, with their jugs and bottles, one might fairly presume that more brandy is drunk in the Sierra in one day, than in many of the towns of Europe in a year. In some parts--for example, in the province of Jauja--hens' eggs are circulated as small coin, forty-eight or fifty being counted for a dollar. In the market-place and in the shops the Indians make most of their purchases with this brittle sort of money: one will give two or three eggs for brandy, another for indigo, and a third for cigars. These eggs are packed in boxes by the shop-keepers, and sent to Lima. From Jauja alone, several thousand loads of eggs are annually forwarded to the capital.