In the winter time, when the snows are heavy, two trains a week are run over to Chile. Sometimes the snowfall is so severe that the traffic is completely blocked, though with the construction of snow-sheds, and fences to resist the drifting snow, there is less danger than formerly. However, there have been times when trains have been held up, and passengers have had to stay for a week at Inca. First-class passengers fend for themselves at the big hotel; but down near the railway station there is a great caravanserai of a place where poorer passengers are provided with rough accommodation, and where they can obtain food at cheap prices. [Illustration: THE INCA BRIDGE IN THE ANDES.] The snow had ceased, but there was a knife-like wind whilst we battled up the hillside, making for the hotel standing gaunt and solitary amongst the barren mountains. We did not object to the little discomfort. It was delightful to get into the warm rooms, to sit down and have a meal, to smoke, to chat, to play billiards, and some of us to have a doze. Then, in the grey of the afternoon, with occasional gleams of sunlight through the heavy clouds which swathed the mountain tops, we sauntered about this straggling, high perched village. There was no passenger train to Mendoza that day. But we had arranged for an engine to take charge of our car and run us back in the dark. So at nightfall we climbed once more into the coach. The stove was ablaze because the air was increasingly cold. Trains only run along this mountain route in the daylight, and so perhaps there was a little nervousness in making the journey down through the valleys in the blackness. In the front of the engine was a great searchlight. So we went groaning and rocking, with the whistle of the engine shrieking in the cañons, on our way back to Mendoza. Once there was a violent jerk when the engine was brought almost to a standstill, for some cattle had strayed upon the line and it was with difficulty they were frightened off the track. We were snug enough in our well-lit coach, where before and after dinner the hours were wiled away with games of cards. Occasionally we halted at the tiny hamlets, and the residents ran out to have a look at the unusual sight of an engine, with a huge gleaming eye in front, picking its way, as it were, through the ravines, whilst behind was an illuminated car with a party of merry Britishers. Once I went on the little platform at the rear of the coach. The whole world was wrapped in blackness. After a time I got used to it. It was possible to discern the ragged silhouettes of the hilltops, and to peer into the cimmerian gloom of the valley where the Mendoza River was hastening noisily toward the plain. No wonder the natives had a horror of these hills.