Silver being the only produce of the soil, living is very dear in the Cerro. All the necessaries of life have to be brought from a great distance; and this, combined with the greediness of the vendors, and the abundance of money, causes enormous prices to be demanded and obtained. House-rent is exorbitantly high; the keep of a horse often costs, owing to the want of forage, from two to three dollars a-day. Here, as at Lima, the coffee and eating-houses are kept by Italians, principally Genoese. The population of the town is the most motley imaginable; scarcely a country in the world but has its representatives. Of the upper classes the darling vice is gambling, carried to an almost unparalleled extent. From earliest morning cards and dice are in full activity: the mine proprietor leaves his counting-house and silver carts, the trader abandons his shop, to indulge for a couple of hours in his favourite amusement; and, when the evening comes, play is universal in all the best houses of the town. The mayordomos, or superintendents of the mines, sit down to the gaming-table at nightfall, and only leave it when at daybreak the bell summons them to the shaft. Often do they gamble away their share in a boya long before signs of one are apparent. Amongst the Indians, drunkenness is the chief failing. When primed by spirits, they become quarrelsome; and scarcely a Sunday or holiday passes without savage fights between the workmen of different mines. Severe wounds, and even deaths, are the consequences of these encounters, in which the authorities never dream of interfering. When, owing to the richness of a boya, the Indian finds himself possessed of an unusual number of dollars, he squanders then in the most ridiculous manner, like a drunken sailor with a year's pay in his pocket. Dr Tschudi saw one fellow buy a Spanish cloak for ninety-two dollars. Draping it round him, he proceeded to the next town, got drunk, rolled himself in the gutter, and then threw away the cloak because it was torn and dirty. A watchmaker told the doctor that once an Indian came to him to buy a gold watch. He handed him one, with the remark that the price was twelve gold ounces, (two hundred and four dollars,) and that it would probably be too dear for him. The Indian took the watch, paid for it, and then dashing it upon the ground, walked away, saying that the thing was no use to him.