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Rh with terrible passes over the snowy heights. But the descent on either side gradually led down to fairer scenes, on one side to the fertile vale of the Jauja, on the other to the coast valleys of Chilca, Lurin, and Rimac. The imposing grandeur of some of this scenery, contrasted with the peaceful beauty of the rest, seems to have been impressed on the imaginations of the Huarochiri, and to have given rise to a mythology full of quaint legends and fables. These will be discussed in the essay on the religious beliefs of the coast people. The temple to the fish god at Pachacamac attracted pilgrims from far and near as a famous oracle, as well as the oracle which gave its name to the Rimac valley. Both appear to have been due to the highly imaginative tendencies of those of the Huarochiris who settled on the coast. It was a little further north, at Pativilca, on the coast, that the more northern dominions of the Grand Chimu found its southern frontier. But this coast region, between Pativilca and the Rimac, seems to have been long in an unsettled state. The dwellings of the chiefs who occupied the Rimac valley were built on immense mounds of great extent, and strongly fortified. The mountain tribes of the maritime cordillera are quite exceptionally interesting, because the advances they had made in civilisation were due largely to their occupation of valleys on the coast.

The Incas received the submission of the mountaineers without invading their fastnesses, and pressed onwards in their northern conquests.