On the 14th of July, they arrived at a spot of marshy ground, from which trickled in tiny streams the waters, which, uniting with others, swell till they form the broad River Huallaga, one of the head tributaries of the Amazon. Their descent was now rapid; and the next day they found themselves on a sudden among fruit-trees, with a patch of sugar-cane, on the banks of the stream. The sudden transition from rugged mountain-peaks, where there was no cultivation, to a tropical vegetation, was marvellous. Two miles farther on, they came in sight of a pretty village, almost hidden in the luxuriant vegetation. The whole valley here becomes very beautiful. The land, which is a rich river-bottom, is laid off into alternate fields of sugar-cane and alfalfa. The blended green and yellow of this growth, divided by willows, interspersed with fruit-trees, and broken into wavy lines by the serpentine course of the river, presented a scene which filled them with pleasurable emotions, and indicated that they had exchanged a semi-barbarous for a civilized society. The party had had no occasion to complain of want of hospitality in any part of their route; but here they seemed to have entered upon a country where that virtue flourished most vigorously, having at its command the means of gratifying it. The owner of the hacienda of Quicacan, an English gentleman named Dyer, received the lieutenant and his large party exactly as if it were a matter of course, and as if they had quite as much right to occupy his house as they had to enter an inn. The next day they had an opportunity to compare with the Englishman a fine specimen of the Peruvian country gentleman. Col. Lucar is thus described: "He is probably the richest and most influential man in the province. He seems to have been the father of husbandry in these parts, and is the very type of the old landed proprietor of Virginia, who has always lived upon his estates, and attended personally to their cultivation. Seated at the head of his table, with his hat on to keep the draught from his head, and which he would insist upon removing unless I would wear mine; his chair surrounded by two or three little negro children, whom he fed with bits from his plate; and attending with patience and kindness to the clamorous wants of a pair of splendid peacocks, a couple of small parrots of brilliant and variegated plumage, and a beautiful and delicate monkey,--I thought I had never seen a more perfect pattern of the patriarch. His kindly and affectionate manner to his domestics, and to his little grand-children, a pair of sprightly boys, who came in the evening from the college, was also very pleasing." The mention of a college in a region in some respects so barbarous may surprise our readers; but such there is. It has a hundred pupils, an income of seventy-five thousand dollars yearly, chemical and philosophical apparatus, and one thousand specimens of European minerals.