Show ffl FAR TIAHBIMGO A South American City of a Very e Old Age S I A VERY STRANGE FESIIVAL i iI I Traditions of a Mysterious People Llamas as Freight Carriers How the Indians I Hanatrc Them i I Ox THE IVixo July 15 1SOO Special correspondence of THE HCKILD The traveler should not bid Roodbye to Bolivia 1 without having paid some attention to an I ancient town near the northeastern edge of Lake Titicaca which Professor Squier has dubbed the Baalbcc of America It is named Tiatmanaco pronounced Tee ah uhanahco andis believed by some scientists scien-tists to be the oldest collection of ruins on the hemisphere At any rate it proves thee the-e of a race so far ANTEDATING THE TIME OF THE INCAS that all knowledge it was lost before the Spaniards camo for when the latter ques tioned the Indians ol those days about the t origin of these mighty monuments they were told that before ever the sun appeared in the heavens a race of giants inhabited I the earth for thousands of years that they grew so numerous the gods becamo jealous und turned them all into stone and what t appear to be the remains of huge buildings I are in reality some of the petrified giants I themselves This highly interesting place may be I easily reached on horseback from Chililaya and if visited during the westward journey from La Pdz it is best to come to the former for-mer village a day or two ahead of the dHt S venda so as not to miss tho weekly steamer and be stranded too long on this desolate coast MODEKN TIUHJAXXCO I contains nothing whatever of interest ex cept that its church and many of its houses are built of beautifully cut ana polished stones taken from ancient temples and palaces pal-aces Even tao pavements ol its streots and the bridges over which wo pass are set with them The tall stone cross in front of the churcbmandSon A lofty l pedestal that I is much better wrought than the Catholic I symbol above it and inscribed with uudc cipherable hieroglyphics perhaps to other I gods The corral where our animals are stalled has in its adobe walls cn numerous blocks of slate colored trachyte with snakes toads and other mysterious emblems carved upon them in short time out of mind the won derful ruins have served as an inexhaustible inexhausti-ble quarr fdr the lazy and ignorant people of the valley The principal ruins lie on a level plain within walking distance from the village and cover an area of about three miles There are several artifical mounds made of earth and stones numerous edifices and the remains of massive walls that probably served as forts or enclosures The highest so of tho mounds was once terraced each terrace ter-race supported by a wall of cut stone and is completely covered and surrounded by ruins with AN ENORMOUS STRUCTURE ON TOP which modern visitors have name Tho Fortress Not far from this hill is the finest edifice o f all so far cs decoration is concerned now known as The Temple It is 445 joe long l abS feet wide made of cut ana pol ishcd blocks of dark basalt each thirti inches i thick These stones arc sunk into the earth like gateposts nobody knows to what depth the parts above mound vary ing l in heght from nine to fourteen feet Those ancient architects whoever the > may have been seem to have not understood under-stood the use of mortar or may be they did not need It being able to build so well without Like King Solomans temple the stones were nil made to lit exactly into one another having iouna holes drilled into the top and bottom of each at correspond ing i distances into which bronze pins were placed Scattered all about are many highly polished blocks which appear never to have been placed in position indicating that the builders were disturbed in their work and left incomplete Among tho most beautifully sculptured and curious relics is an enormous block of sandstone one single slab thirteen feet bj i five inches long eighteen inches thick and standing a little over seven feet above the ground which though badly cracked the natives say by lightning is still upright It must bo SUNK DEEPLY INTO TIIE EARTH to have stood so long without external support sup-port and was doubtless meant for a doorway door-way as it has a central cutting four fee six inches high by two feet nine inches wide Across the upper face above this doorway figures high relief are carved which closely resemble the sculpture of i Egypt and scientists say that a finer piece of cutting in the same kind of stone by artisans ancient or modern cannot bo I found anywhere in the world Within the temple enclosure is a hori zontal slab about fourteen feet square with a deep hollow in the middle cut out like a square trough which is supposed to I have served in some of the ceremonies of sun worship The great temple is composed I of huge blocks of red sandstone each fourteen four-teen feet long and of corresponding width and thickness all precisely alike cut and laid with nicest care This is the more remarkable as those early people must I have been entirely unacquainted with iron and steel and could have had no mechanical mechani-Cal apparatus for carrying or working heavy bodies every bit of tho labor bavin I to IKS ACCOMPLISHED rr HCMAX STRENGTH Neither could they have Tiafl any knowl S edge of gunpowder or other explosives but that they were familiar with the use of bronze is proved by tho pins above mentioned men-tioned and a few weapons that have como to light From some clillsof red sandstone 1 more than teen miles away every one of theso enormous temple blocks must have been carried but no basalt nor trachyte is found nearer than forty miles There seems besides to have been a pal palS ace a prison hall of justice and other institutions ¬ in-stitutions which show that the trace t-race possessed some degree of civilization and refinement None can gaze upon theso monuments without being I fllicd with i wonder won-der conccininp the mysterious people who lived and died centuries before Columbus or any otherEuiopean had sought the western west-ern hcmisph Itdoes not need a mighty stretch of imagination to rebuild theso fallen walls a gd repeoplo them with dark eJ t IOg skinned men and women going about their daily avocations worshiping the sungod with barbarous rites in the great temple or toiling up the terraced mound to look out from its fortress for TIn FOREIGN rOEs who seem to have come at length and conquered 1 con-quered them Dig as you maymot a trace of grave or sepulcher can be found and tho supposition is that the early Tiahuanacans either fled from their walled city or were driven from it by invaders The stupid L neighbors of today have no hints nor suggestions sug-gestions to offer neither history nor tradition i tradi-tion thlWS coy light on the subject the arcbacolcgistcan only turn away with burning t burn-ing unsatisfied Professor Squier tells us that he happened hap-pened to visit Tiahuanaco during tho an mml cftuno potato festival of the modern Indians that vegetable as all tho world knows being indigenous to this portion of South America though it has been vastly improved in some of the countries to which it has been transplanted Ho says that tho people were dancing in the public square in front of the cathedral to tho music of drums and tambourines and were wearing enormous headdresses resembling umbrel las made mostly of feathers wrought into the form of flowers Each group of men was accompanied by a number of female dancers the latter wearing hats with wide stiff brims the crowns surrounded fan like representations ofthe xising sun set with mall lockinggrasses tipped with clusters feather flowers All thawomen wore skyblue dresses and over the left shoulder of each asA as-A CABF OF HANDWOVEN WOOL striped with brilliant colors This chuno festival is participated in by all the Indians far and near and is a curious curi-ous mingling of thd rites of the heathen Incas and ceremonies of the church Though antedating the Christianization of I the country it is carried on to day under the control of the priests who through the I three hundred and fifty years that havo intervened in-tervened since the conquest have always found it expedient to retain some traces of the ancient customes As in these regions Indians and llamas are generally seen together a description of ono animal without mention of the other would bo incomplete One who has never seen a llama can hardly form an idea of how he strange little creature looks with the beaU of a camel the body of a deer the wool of a sheep the hoofs of a mule and the neigh of a horse It is found nowhere but in tho Andes and is the more interesting because it is the only native domesticated animal in South America the ox horse sheep hog and all others useful to man baa tog been brou originally from some other country It is THE ONLY BEAST OF BURDEN used in the higher altitudes where mules and horses cannot endure the thin air as It alone is exempt from girrocic its natural home beic < 9000 feet and upwards Though domesticated in Pern Bolivia and Chili and not ablo to live below a certain elevation unless the weather is very cold great numbers num-bers > of them run wild on the foothills and sandy plains of Patagonia oven near the level of the sea so far from the equator A fullgrown llama is about the size of a yearoldcolt standing from four to six feet high and is covered with a long and sur risingly thick coat of wool which however is seldom sheared as the animal is used only for purposes of transportation Its usual color is i muddy brown while a few arc light yellow or nearly white The Indians dians paint the latter with liquid dyes and very odd it looks to see a troop of them in aU the colors of thorainbow red blue purple pur-ple > pink and green with gay tassels dang lIng from their ears Many of the most valuable mines of Peru and Bolivia could hardly be carried on without theso hardy and surefooted little animals though not one of them can bo made to bear more than a hundred pounds weight while THE AVERAGE LOAD or A ChutE is three hundred pounds On all the moun ain roads leading from the mines hundreds of llamas may be seen with bags offo tn hit 1 as tho powdered ore is called fastened to packsaddles on their backs by ropes made from their own wool which the Indians pull > spin and weave as they wait along Where tho trails are dangerously narrow each troop is led by one having a bell itt ached to his neck so that travelers coming from the other direction may bo warned by he ringing to wait in some place where here is room enough to pass None but Indians shy as themselves and unhampered by the ways of civilization can manage llamas and white men never attempt is If an ounca more than tho 100 I pounds be added to his burden the beast will lie down and refuse to stir until the surplus is removed and whenever he is i tired burden or no burden ho is bound to stretch out until well rested Meanwhile he patient driver will halt all the rest of the Hock and lie down too waiting by the roadsido until tho refractory animal is i ready to move on An Indian er strikes his llamas tho utmost coercion he uses under any circumstances being a gentle push Indeed lIE TUES BETTER CARE OE THEM than he does of his own children perhaps with good reason since the fourfooted animals i ani-mals are of more value commercially Tho latter arc worth alive about seven dollars la apiece but sell for more when dead in tho shape of bides meat and tallow Tho natives na-tives prefer llama flesh after it has been frozen to any other kind bf meat and make great account of too tallow whish Is called fabo using it for many purposes Male ilamas only carry freight the females fe-males being kept in corral for breeding purposes Soon as a young malo is ready t to stand he is trained to bear burdens ant d a an-t two years old is put into an atyitfla the usual drove of twenty animals To drive this number easily two persons aro required re-quired An Indian will take his alqulla with 100 pounds piled on the back of each and assistd by his wife or child will drive them to a distance of 110 miles in eighteen or twenty days For this service be charges at the rate of eighty cents per diem to each beast Bolivian cents worth about half as much as ours At this price he feeds himself him-self and the animals and furnishes the necessary nec-essary ropes sacks and other equipments reckoning FOttTY CENTS A DAY FOR THE LLAMAS twenty cents for the sucks and ropes and twenty cents for the food of himself and companern The sack in which ho carries grain ore etc costs in the currency of tho country S123 but will last a long time Under this contract ho will sometimes make a jovrnoy of two or three months duration and save money out of it The llama subsists ulon mountain shrub or a specie of tough coarse grass mixed with the sand in whichitgrows Hedrinks almost no water and can travel without food for a week if given a square meal at both ends of the journey If too well fe atd lads subject to a skin disease which invariable invar-iable i proves falal Some years ago in 155 7 I believe an effort was made to introduce llamas into the United States but it could not be carried out principally because the food was too good for them Seventy o llamas were taken from Peru to Now York Only thirtyeight of that number survived the sea voyage and those were wintered on a Long Island farm which certainly must have been cold enough for the most fastidious fastid-ious animal of the Andes In tho spring scarcely a dozen of these were left alive theso were sold to MUSEUMS AND MENAGERIES and died at the first approach of warm weather A circumstance in connection with this singular animal should not be omitted viz that its dung is universally used for fuel in Bolivia ana many parts of Peru 3t burns as readily wood gives out a great deal of heat has no odor and can be bought at the I rate of sixty cents pel hundred weight therefore it IS highly prized injreelesq sections sec-tions where coal costs from = 35 to 543 pet ton and the only other alternative is a kind of spongy fungus that grows on the mountains moun-tains A great deal of complaint is just now rife in La Pa against the electric light company tho citizens asserting that so much llama dung is consumed by its furnaces that their supply of fuel will soon be exhausted Knowing it to be in general use in the kitchens of the countrv tho tourist in these parts ceases to insist on toast and broiled meals and becomes quite willing to put up with the eternal stows and fries The commercial name of the fuel is laquta and owiog to the habits of the animal it is by no means difficult to gather For example in certain places along every road where llamas are driven ALWAYS AT THE TOOT OF THE HILLS and in these places only will taquin bo found not an atom of it anywhere clIo f orals miles around The same is true in corr or-als and fields where the animals graze each invariable i adding his own quota to the general accumulation always in precisely tho same spot Llamas have a queer but effctivo way of defending themselves when teased or made angry Stamping the foro feet and turning suddenly upon the object of rage they will eject between the teeth a pint or more of saliva throwing it with great force a distance dis-tance of several feet This saliva produces a stinging sensation on the skin and if it gets into the mouth or eyes or on any place where the skin is broken violent in ama tion is immediately caused and deadly blood poisoning has been known to ensue Therefore There-fore those who era acquainted with the peculiarities of the beast are very careful to keep on the right side of his temper and at a respectful distance from his nose FANNIE B WARD |