The chasquis were dressed in a peculiar livery, intimating their profession. They were all trained to the employment and selected for their speed and fidelity. As the distance each courier had to perform was small, and as he had ample time to refresh himself at the stations, they ran over the ground with great swiftness, and messages were carried through the whole extent of the long routes, at the rate of one hundred and fifty miles a day. The office of the chasquis was not limited to carrying dispatches. They frequently brought various articles for the use of the court and in this way fish from the distant ocean, fruits, game, and different commodities from the hot regions on the coast, were taken to the capital in good condition, and served fresh at the royal table. It is remarkable that this important institution should have been known to both the Mexicans and the Peruvians without any correspondence with one another and that it should have been found among two barbarian nations of the New World long before it was introduced among the civilized nations of Europe. By these wise contrivances of the Incas, the most distant parts of the long extended empire of Peru were brought into intimate relations with each other. The while the capitals of Christendom, but a few hundred miles apart, remained as far asunder as if seas had rolled between them, the great capitals Cuzco and Quito were placed by the high roads of the Incas in immediate correspondence. Intelligence from the numerous provinces was transmitted on the wings of the wind to the Peruvian metropolis, the great focus to which all the lines of communication converged. Not an insurrectionary movement could occur, not an invasion on the remotest frontier, before the tidings were conveyed to the capital and the imperial armies were on their march across the magnificent roads of the country to suppress it. So admirable was the machinery contrived by the American despots for maintaining tranquillity throughout their dominions! It may remind us of the similar institutions of ancient Rome, when, under the Caesars, she was mistress of half the world. Hiram Bingham, Director of the Geographic Society-Yale Peruvian Expedition[15] gives an interesting description of the tracing out of two of these old roads. Evidently the trail was mostly used by foot passengers, or possibly llamas, for there were frequently steep grades and flights of steps and open ravines which had more than likely been crossed by the osier suspension bridges. No doubt much commerce beside fertilizer from the great nitrate beds was carried on over these roads.