From one league below Cocachacra we have syenite extending the distance of half a league by our way. It is followed by syenetic granite, and continues for some distance with a varying aspect, till it runs gradually into the coarse granite, which also appears in large loose blocks heaped on the face of the naked mountains between Saint Ana and Chaclacayo as we enter the headland of the Vale of Rimac.
The above-named villages of Chaclacayo (six leagues from the city), Cocachacra, Surco, Matucana, and San Mateo, afford successive stages, and gradations of changes of air and climate to invalids from Lima, who are too enfeebled, or otherwise find it not convenient, to proceed beyond San Mateo, or to cross the Cordillera by Yauli for Tarma, nineteen leagues to the north-east of San Mateo.
[1] In Piura the temperature of the air, in summer, ranges from 80° to 96°, and in winter from 70° to 81°, Fahrenheit. The sea-breeze, or southerly wind, which commences to be felt about ten o’clock in the forenoon, is here hailed as the messenger of health by the natives, who are never visited by any sweeping and fatal epidemics.
[2] Lima is situated in lat. 12° 2´ south, and long. 76° 58´ west. It stands six or seven miles inland from its sea-port of Callao, and the more elevated part of the city is about five hundred feet above the level of the sea. It has frequently suffered from earthquakes, which are very common; and one of the most remarkable occurred in the year 1828. Houses of one story have their walls usually composed of sun-burnt bricks called _adobes_; but, that they may be better able to resist the shocks to which they are so often exposed, they are principally constructed, when of more than one story high, of wood and cane: the whole work, inside and out, being plastered over with clay, and white-washed or painted.
[3] The Rimac divides the city of Lima from its suburbs of San Lazaro, and has over it an excellent bridge close to the palace. This bridge, accommodated with recesses and seats, is greatly resorted to in fine evenings. The young ladies of the metropolis, in their imposing evening party or tertulia attire and decoration, are fond, in times of public tranquillity, to saunter to the bridge on moonlight nights, and there to breathe the pure air of mountain and sea blended and eddying as it gives freshness to the pale cheek, and, in its cool and circling current, wafts fragrance from the choice flowers at this social hour gracefully wreathed around the Rimac beauties’ heads.