At length the steamer leaves Panama, and the passenger for the United States begins his long journey. His companions are very few, South Americans, principally, bound for ports along the coast, so he is left to his own resources. He can read, and lounge, and make good friends with the officers of the ship, who are Englishmen. At night he can stretch out in his steamer chair and dream away the warm hours gazing at the “majestical roof fretted with golden fire.”
From Panama to Valparaiso, some 3,100 miles, 25 ports are touched at, which, Callao excepted, are of no special interest. Callao, the seaport of Peru, is in itself unattractive, the town and the people are dirty; the empty docks, the lazy inhabitants, the atmosphere of _laissez aller_, confirm the opinion that the place and all around it have had their day. From Callao the traveller should go to Lima, 7 miles distant by rail, and take the Oroya Railway to the top of the Andes, 15,000 feet above the sea-level: the wonderful engineering ability displayed in constructing this road will prove quite as impressive as the truly magnificent mountain scenery. Two days will suffice to make the excursion and bring him back to Lima, an old Spanish city with many interesting corners. The cathedral should be visited; in the crypt lie the bones of the great Pizarro. A dirty Cholo shows them. Reverently pulling aside a ragged curtain from before a dingy stone bench, he exclaims, “Behold the bones of Francisco Pizarro!” Their state of perfect preservation and symmetry of arrangement might incline one to doubt the truth of the statement.
[Illustration: The Port of Valparaiso in a Norther.]
Leaving Callao, en route for Valparaiso, the steamer makes several ports; some of them interesting because of the recent war operations, but otherwise they had better be viewed from the ship’s deck, for the same low adobe dwellings and squalid existence characterize them all. After 11 days of pleasant weather Valparaiso is reached. Valparaiso is built on several hill slopes running to the water from a high ridge back of the city. It is a place of great activity; the docks are piled high with freight, the people move about with spirit, the harbor is full of ships, and there is that general air which betokens financial soundness and commercial prosperity. The streets are noticeably clean, the buildings are of good architecture, the stores are inviting, and the frequently recurring signs in English, French, and German, and the people met, are indicative of the cosmopolitan nature of the inhabitants.