Huánuco

“ Rice, tobacco, and straw hats, in small quantities, are now brought on the backs of Indians from the towns on the Huallaga to Huanuco.
Colonel Lucar showed me his "cuarto de habios," or room where he keeps all his horse furniture. He has at least a dozen saddles of various patterns, with bridles, pillons, horse-cloths, holsters, and everything complete. Most of the bridles and stirrups are heavily plated with silver. People take great care of their horses in this country, and are generally good horsemen. There are one or two carriages and gigs in Huanuco, made in England. ”

“ CHAPTER LXXX. Of the situation of this city, of the fertility of its fields, and of the customs of its inhabitants: also concerning a beautiful edifice or palace of the Yncas at Huanuco.
THE situation of this city of Leon de Huanuco is good, and is considered very healthy. It is praised as a place where the nights and mornings are cool, and where men are healthy, owing to a good climate. They reap wheat and maize in great abundance, and they also have grapes, figs, oranges, lemons, limes, and other fruits of Spain; and of the fruits of the country there are many kinds which are excellent. ”

“ A staple article of Huanuco commerce with Cerro Pasco is the coca-leaf, from their Montaña, only distant about fifteen leagues from the city; an article of which they have several crops yearly. The indigo growers in the contiguous Montaña have, we believe, forsaken their enterprise, for want of funds to proceed with the manufacture of what, from the samples produced, was considered a good article. ”

“ One party had been to Huanuco by land, with a cargo of straw hats and tobacco, which they sold at about fifty per cent. advance on prime cost. This is a miserable traffic, for the round trip occupies four months, and is one of great hardship. The other party were going by the river in 143 canoes to Huanuco, with the same cargo, and in addition some rice and rare birds. Travellers go up by the river when it is low, and by land when the river is high. The returning party were going down on balsas, which they had constructed at Tingo Maria. ”

“ Huanuco, the principal city of the province of the same name, though [67] no longer the seat of opulence or aristocracy, was once one of the chief cities of Peru under the ancient conquerors, and is at present chiefly distinguished as the capital of the whole department of Junin. The prefect of this jurisdiction extends his authority as far as the country of Maynas on the north, and to the banks of the river Paro, or Beni, on the east, passing through the intervening wilds of the Pajonal and pampa del Sacramento, &c. ”

“ In 1726, the converted Indians about the head of canoe navigation on the Huallaga, (the tidings of the gospel were first carried to these from Huanuco, by Felipe Luyendo, in 1631,) crossing the hills that border that river on its eastern bank, discovered a wooded plain, which was named Pampa del Sacramento, from the day of its discovery being the festival of Corpus Cristi. This was a new field for the missionary; and by 1760, the Fathers of the college at Ocopa had penetrated across this plain to the Ucayali, and re-established the missions of Manoa, the former spiritual conquests of Biedma. ”

“ Vegetables and fruit are abundant and cheap. This is, par excellence, the country of the celebrated chirimoya. I have seen this fruit in Huanuco quite twice as large as it is generally seen in Lima, and of most delicious flavor. They have a custom here to cover the finest specimens with gold leaf, and place them as a decoration on the altar of some patron Saint on his festival. The church afterwards sells them; and I have seen several on Colonel Lucar's table. ”

“ The agriculture of Huanuco,—though alluring to the eye of the ordinary traveller, who only glances at its rich and waving fields, enclosed within tapias or fences of mud, and hedges of the Indian [41] fig, and aloe or maguey plants,—is in every way defective as a branch of industry. The fields owe their luxuriance to nature rather than to man, except in the single advantage of water, which he often directs and supplies to them. Manure is a thing never thought of ”

“ In the above route from Huanuco, the Franciscans from the time they left their last christianized settlement, Pozuzu, (some years ago depopulated by the small-pox,) had to contend with the Amajes, Carapachos, Callisecas, and other savage tribes, occupying the territory between Pozuzo and the mouth of the Pachitea. ”

“ Our course lay down the valley N. E., crossing the river soon after leaving the town by a rude bridge floored with the leaves of the maguey. We found the road good, but rocky, principally with the debris of quartz. Gold is occasionally found, but in small quantities, in the mountains bordering this valley. At six miles from Huanuco we passed the village of Sta. Maria del Valle, of three hundred inhabitants. We stopped and took some fruit and pisco with the curate, to whom also I had a letter from Lima.
Every traveller in this country should provide himself with letters of introduction. ”

“ Their temples were in places convenient for making sacrifices and performing other superstitious rites, and where those could hear the replies of the devil who were set apart for that duty. They believed in the immortality of the soul in that same blind fashion as is common with all the other Indians. These Indians of Huanuco are intelligent, but they answer Yes! to everything that is asked of them. [408] The chiefs, when they died, were not put into their tombs alone, but were accompanied by the most beautiful of their wives, as is the custom with all the other tribes. ”

“ Lopez, he encourages the rising generation to take the best advantage of the new path to knowledge, virtue, and honourable distinction now freely opened to them by the meritorious exertions of two of the most eminent natives of Huanuco. ”

“ When the population of the Cerro rises to ten or twelve thousand, every article of Huanuco produce is in high demand; but when, from any cause, the mines are not [47] wrought, or when these are inundated from defective drainage, and the hands employed in working them are fewer in number, the Huanuqueños and other neighbouring agriculturists are greatly discouraged or actually ruined; because, deprived of this outlet for their produce, they cannot undertake the expense of sending sugar and spirits on mules to the coast. The consequence is, that they are frequently poor in the midst of plenty ”

“ The provinces of this department are Jauja, Tarma, Pasco, Cajatambo, Huari, Huaylas, Huamalies, Conchucos, and Huanuco. Besides the precious metals, (and quicksilver, which for some time back has been regularly extracted from the mines of Jonta in Huamalies,) these provinces yield a great variety of cattle and vegetable produce. ”

“ Huanuco itself is 6300 feet above the sea; [374] the distance thence to the summit of the cuesta del Carpis, which is 8000 feet above the sea, is about twenty miles, and there is a descent on the other side into the valley of the Casapi of 2920 feet. [375] According to this [Pg 325] account the village of Chinchao, in the Casapi valley, would have an elevation of about 5000 feet. From Chinchao to the foot of the Cocheros mountain is a distance of twenty-five miles down the Casapi valley, [376] a gentle descent, with numerous cottages and plantations on both sides of the road. ”

“ In the montaña there is variation due to altitude, as in the sierra, as this region includes the forested district from an altitude of nearly 10,000 feet down to 1000 or less in the basin of the large Amazon tributaries. From 3000 to 7000 feet the climate is delightful to those who do not enjoy greater contrasts. Huánuco, altitude 6270 feet, has an annual temperature of 74°, other places a lower temperature, and far down, as at Iquitos, a higher. ”

“ It is now augmented in every direction by new rivers, receiving among others, to the east, the river of the Moon, in the altitude of 7 degrees 40 minutes south latitude. Continuing its rapid course to the north, it takes a bend at the town del Valle, in 7 degrees 50 minutes, and, forming two difficult passes named Sabaloyaco and Cachahuanusca, immediately before its confluence with the Huayabamba, it passes along the confines of the province of Lamas, where it changes its name of Huanuco to that of Huallaga. ”

“ The lower class of people do not attend to this, and thus the disease is more general with them than with the higher classes. It is disagreeable to walk out in the middle of the day, on account of a strong northerly wind, which sets in at this season about noon, and lasts till dark, raising clouds of dust. The mornings and evenings are very pleasant, though the sun is hot for an hour or two before the breeze sets in. The height of Huanuco above the level of the sea is, by boiling point, five thousand nine hundred and forty-six feet. ”

“ By this department the traveller may reach the river of Huanuco, by directing his route from Chavin to the haven of Chicoplaya, distant twenty-eight leagues. Twenty-six of these leagues are performed, with the help of mules, in five days, the following baiting-places intervening: namely Tantamayo, Carpa, Santa Rosa, Chipaco, Monzon, and Chicoplaya; and the other two are travelled on foot, from the latter town to its haven: thence to Playa-Grande there are nine leagues, which are navigated by the river Monzon; and four and a half to the junction of that river with the Huanuco. ”

“ I am told that they never eat at night. They seek the cold regions of the Andes; nature has provided them with a warm fleece of wool, and they need no shelter. Though they are feeble animals, their usual daily travel is about 15 miles; but after three or four days journey, they must have rest or they perish on the road. The motion of the head and neck as they cross the mountain crags may be likened to that of the swan, as it floats over smooth water. The wool makes good coarse cloth, of various colors, seldom all of one color. The huanaco is known by its being rather larger than the llama ”

“ In Huancavelica they were also well received, by this time occupying all central Peru and cutting off the capital from communication with the royalist forces of Pezuela and Ramirez. The viceroy sent Colonel Vicente Gonzalez to meet them, and a battle took place at Huanta, the royalists gaining the day after seven hours’ fighting, during which the streets and suburbs 134of Huanta were filled with the dead and wounded. Bejar, Angulo, and Mendoza returned to Andahuaylas for reinforcements,—which were supplied by the patriots of Abancay and other towns,—and then prepared to march on Huamanga. ”

“ It is surrounded by mountains and is therefore cold, but a beautiful river flows through it, on the banks of which grow wheat, vines, figs, oranges, lemons, and many other plants which have been brought from Spain. In ancient times there were buildings for the chiefs in the meadows and dales of this valley, and many cultivated fields for them and for the temple of the sun. The province of Huamachuco is like that of Caxamarca, and the Indians are of the same race, imitating each other in their religion and sacrifices, as well as in their clothes and head-dress. ”

“ In the valley of Xauxa the invaders came upon the army of the Huanca, on which they inflicted a final defeat. The Inca spared and liberated the prisoners of war, who were numerous. Once more, at Tarma, were the Huanca beaten, after which all resistance appears to have been overcome. The city-state of Cuzco was now the dominant power throughout the whole of Central Peru, a territory 300 miles in length, whilst it exercised a kind of suzerainty over a district of equal extent toward the south-east, which it shortly converted into actual dominion. ”

“ Even to-day its population is largely Indian, among whom the chewing of coca leaves is general—the first place south of Almaguer in Colombia of which this could be said.
But the Huamachuco of to-day does not exactly coincide with that of Pizarro’s time. The effete descendants of a more hardy race have crawled down into a sheltering valley, leaving uninhabited the ancient “city of the Gentiles” on the mountain above. A local editor, apparently for no better reason than the pleasure of basking in a gringo smile, offered to serve me as guide. ”

“ Huanta lies close to the great montaña, or Amazonian hot-lands, and the “chocolate de Huanta” is famous throughout Peru. But the trails to that fruitful region are so nearly impassable that the interchange of products is only a fraction of what it might be. Set in one of the dry belts that are so frequent in the Andes, the great, tilted plain depends on irrigation for most of its fruits. Molle, fig, and willow trees abound, yet the ground beneath them is barren of grass. Eighty percent. of the valley is said to be chiefly Indian in blood. ”

“ Molina often mentions the worship of this hero, Huanacauri. Garcilasso de la Vega refers to Huanacauri four times (i, 65, 66; ii, 169, 230) . He says that the first settlement made in the valley of Cuzco was on the hill called Huanacauri, and that a very sacred temple was built there. Molina refers to the sacrifices offered up there. The idol of Huanacauri was a great figure of a man, “their principal huaca, the brother of Manco Ccapac, whence they descend”. The ceremonies of arming youths were a good deal connected with this Huanacauri idol. ”