Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/370

320 in restraining, by gentle means, a nation which had constantly been the scourge of the province, on this very account, that the inhabitants held the arm raised, not merely for their own defence, but through motives of wrath and vengeance. These Indians now blend with the songs of their past triumphs, encomiastic hymns to manifest their gratitude, and to record the memory of those who have not only given them peace, but have impressed on all sides the conviction, that it is not politic to break it. How flattering to the ears of the enlightened Spaniards, of the monarch, and of all Europe, will be the echo of the pacific strains the Chirihuano repeats, and the harmonious concert with which they are answered, from the kingdom of Chile, by the Araucanos, Pehuenches, and Wiliches, who acknowledge that they are at this time indebted for equal benefits, to their president Don Ambrosio Higgins! Here our imagination is exalted, and our pen can scarcely abstain from enthusiasm! Would that we could transmit to the public the agitation of our spirit, and the vehement impulse of the divinity which possesses us, to the end that it might view with complacency the new episode we introduce, to inculcate the sacred rights of man, the blessings of peace, the love the Indian claims from us, and the small share of merit which attends the blood-stained triumph over men, untameable but naked, who purchase their freedom at the dear price of living in the rude forests, a prey to penury and want! We now proceed to the chorographical description of the province of Chichas y Tarija, that being our principal aim.

Hitherto we have considered these two departments in the same point of view, because they constitute one and the same government; but in this sketch it is necessary to divide them topogra-