As we enter these plains, susceptible of indefinite improvement and vast returns, we are everywhere surrounded with the vestiges of antiquity, particularly with the ruins of guacas, that at a distance look like little hills or knolls scattered over the open plains; but we think that they were once used as so many tombs of the Sun-worshippers of the land. In some of these mouldering monuments there are yet to be found internal chambers or sepulchral vaults, entered by very narrow openings; and, from these labyrinths, mummies, cloths of different colours, various domestic utensils, and sacred figures and idols, have been not unfrequently extracted. We have in our possession a neat silver idol in the figure of an Inca, with a llama of the same material and workmanship, procured from a guaca, and presented to us by our friend the Rev. Dr. Don Lucas Pellicer, an eminent and classical Limeño, of whose merits as a scholar and patriotic statesman his country feels justly proud. Many other curious relics of an ancient people are dug out from the same edifices, of which the assiduous Don Mariano Rivero has made the most extensive and interesting collection which is now extant in Peru; and with correct drawings and descriptions of these he has, for some time back, proposed to favour the public, and to enrich the history of his native country. The tombs from which relics of this kind are usually taken are not, however, confined to the neighbourhood of Lima, Truxillo, or the coast in general, where their structure of moulded earth and sun-burnt clay is best preserved on account of the absence of rain. Such remains are still seen in some parts of the Sierra; and in speaking of the guacas, (which he conceives to have been temples) in his “Historia natural y moral de las Indias,” vol. ii. p. 128, Acosta tells us that “there were in Cuzco[25] more than four hundred temples of idols, looked upon as sacred earth, and all places were full of mysteries. As they” (the Incas) “went on with their conquests, so they introduced their own guacas and rites into all that state. The Great Being whom they adored was the Viracocha Pachayachic, who is the Creator of the world; and after him the Sun; and thus they said that the Sun, like all the other guacas, received virtue and being from the Creator, and that they were intercessors with him.” CHAPTER X. Journey from Lima to Pasco by Obrajillo.—Diversity of air and climate.—Canta, a locality favourable to consumptive individuals.—Obrajillo, residence of muleteers.—Relay of mules, and payment in advance.—Cultivation and crops.—Ascent to and pass of the Cordillera—Veta, or Cordillera sickness.—Indian hut.—Muleteers’ lodgings on the Puna.—Wallay.—Diesmo.—Pasco.