Indeed, in many places, it would seem that Nature has placed the gold here in a form such that recovery will remunerate the natural son of the soil, when a more greedy and better-equipped "company" would be unable to pay its way. The stores of gold possessed by the Incas of Peru were won by such primitive methods; large bodies of Indians being employed upon the work, and evidences of their operations remain to the present time.
The ancient folk of the Andes had as their greatest food products maiz, millet and potatoes, together with the numerous tropical fruits of the lowlands. They gave Europe the potato--surely no inconsiderable gift--having developed it in Ecuador, Peru and Chile, from the wild, bitter variety; and Europe gave them wheat and other cereals, and, of course, the domestic animals--ox, cow, sheep, horse and pig.
The llama was their only beast of burden here--this curious, hoofed, ruminating quadruped of the camel tribe, with its long neck and timid face. In our journeys along these bleak uplands we shall meet large droves of the llamas, bearing loads of merchandise, in weight up to a hundred pounds. These animals are sagacious in their way, and if overloaded refuse to move. Their services, their wool, their flesh, are all extremely valuable adjuncts of Indian life. The creature costs little or nothing to keep: it requires no shelter, and it feeds itself as it goes along, at a rate of about four miles an hour. The llama indeed was--and is--an outstanding figure in the native economics of the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes. Its cousin the alpaca is also to be seen in large bands.
Up to the limit of the temperate zone in the Peruvian Andes, about 11,500 feet, we shall remark some of the familiar flora of England, such as ferns, nettles, buttercups, violets and stitchwort, together with wild geraniums and pelargoniums. Apples, pears, cherries and strawberries also grow, under desultory cultivation. Trees are scant in the almost treeless Andes, and we find little beyond the groves of stunted _quinua_ and other native shrubs, which, however, are valuable for fuel. The _ichu_ grass--_stipa Incana_--which also serves for "thatching" the Indian huts, is the predominant herbage.