Page:A history of Chile.djvu/179

 THE HE VOL UTIONAR Y PERIOD 163 by the usual route, passing Cuevas. It was such a march as Almagro undertook two hundred and eighty years before ; it was a Hannibal or a Bonaparte cross- ing the Alps. Each cavalryman had a sword, ahorse, a saddle, a poncho; each infantry soldier carried a musket, cartridge-pouch and poncho, besides provisions for the journey. The latter consisted of dried meat and parched corn. Thus the army was not incumbered with baggage, tents, stores or provisions. There were depots of provender established every twelve leagues. There were 7,359 mules for the workmen and cavalry, and 1,922 beef cattle. Fieldpieces were carried, slung between mules, or dragged on sledges made of hides. Derricks were used to hoist or lower them over precipi- tous places. Ti€ gauchos were soon short of provisions and this fact caused them to push forward with incredible exer- tion so that the rapidity with which they traversed the passes, here more than 13,000 feet above sea-level and covered with perpetual snow, is almost beyond belief. Three hundred miles over the giddy verges of yawning quebradas, they passed in thirteen days. The army, consisting cf three thousand infantr5', nine hundred and sixty cavalry, with staff and trains and workmen mounted on mules, reached the valley of Aconcagua on February 8th. The cavalry, which had come by one route, tarried at Putaendo to rest ; the infantry, coming another way, remained at the entrance to the valley. A junction of all the forces was soon after effected at Villa Nueva. On February 7th, a skimish took place at the foot of the cuesta of Chacabuco with the Spanish who were picketed there, and this advance force was com- pelled to fall back on the main body of the royalist army advancing from the south under General Maroto,