"The poor Cholo has retained one fortunate condition from the civilization of his Inca forbears--he is an independent landholder. The small holding, or _chacara_, which he has wrested from Nature's chaos of rocks and ravines on the Andine slopes is his own; no one can dispossess him of it, and it affords him sufficient crop of _maiz_, potatoes, and, in places, _alfalfa_, to keep him and those dependent upon him. He is often, in addition, the owner of herds of _llamas_, _alpacas_, or sheep and goats, and from their wool he and his woman spin, and weave with their primitive looms, the 'tweeds'--for of this nature is the native cloth--and felt hat, which are his garments. These small holdings have been made in the most inaccessible places in many cases, by clearing away rocks and banking up the ground on the lower side in a similar way to that in which the _andenes_, or old cultivated terraces of the Inca period, were formed, and which still remain and excite the traveller's notice throughout the whole Andine region. "Indeed, to the rough, topographical conditions and difficult environment of these small holdings is due the Cholos' undisputed possession, in the first instance, thereof. Had they existed in more favourable situations they would have been annexed long ago, first by the Spanish landholders, and then by the owners of large _haciendas_ under the Republic, or taken by the petty authorities under one or another pretext. It is again an instance of Nature protecting her progeny against the ravages of their own kind. The laws of the Republic now forbid these small holdings to be alienated from the Cholos; a wise measure, tending to preserve this useful peasant class.