But the Peruvians seemed to take pleasure
in wrestling with the difficulties of nature. Near Caxamarca, a
tunnel is still visible, which they excavated in the mountains,
to give an outlet to the waters of a lake, when these rose to a
height in the rainy seasons that threatened the country with
inundation. *19
[Footnote 19: Sarmiento, Relacion, Ms., cap. 21. - Garcilasso,
Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 5, cap. 24. - Stevenson, Narrative of a
Twenty Years' Residence in S. America, (London, 1829,) vol. I. p.
412; II. pp. 173, 174.
"Sacauan acequias en cabos y por partes que es cosa estrana
afirmar lo: porque las echauan por lugares altos y baxos: y por
laderas de los cabecos y haldas de sierras q estan en los valles:
y por ellos mismos atrauiessan muchas: unas por una parte, y
otras por otra, que es gran delectacio caminar por aquellos
valles: porque parece que se anda entre huertas y florestas
llenas de frescuras." Cieza de Leon, Cronica, cap. 66.]
Most of these beneficent works of the Incas were suffered to go
to decay by their Spanish conquerors. In some spots, the waters
are still left to flow in their silent, subterraneous channels,
whose windings and whose sources have been alike unexplored.
Others, though partially dilapidated, and closed up with rubbish
and the rank vegetation of the soil, still betray their course by
occasional patches of fertility. Such are the remains in the
valley of Nasca, a fruitful spot that lies between long tracts of
desert; where the ancient water-courses of the Incas, measuring
four or five feet in depth by three in width, and formed of large
blocks of uncemented masonry, are conducted from an unknown
distance.
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