Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/507

Rh from the one made in the year 1783, by order of the viceroy, for the purpose of ascertaining whether a road for the passage of cattle could be opened from Pozuzu to the haven of Mayro, it results, that from Huanuco to Pozuzu there is a distance of thirty-three leagues, which may be performed with ease in six days. From Pozuzu to Mayro, the computed distance is sixteen leagues, which require three days;, and from the haven of Mayro to the union of the rivers Pachitea and Ucayali, seventy leagues are reckoned, on account of the great windings made by the river. These may be navigated in five days; and the passage from the above-mentioned union to Manoa, in two or three. Hence it appears, that from Huanuco to Manoa there are a hundred and seventy leagues, which may be travelled by land and in canoes in sixteen days, as soon as the inhabitants of Panao shall have completed the road, for the passage of mules, from Pozuzu to Mayro, for the sum of four thousand piastres, agreeably to the formal contract they entered into with me in the month of July of the last year, 1790; and whenever the fortified town at the mouth of the haven shall be built, conformably to the mandate of his Majesty, inserted in various schedules, more particularly in those of the years 1777 and 1779.

When I perceived, in the year 1787, that all the roads for the restoration of the Manoa missions, by Caxamarquilla, Mayro, and Cuchero, were closed and impracticable; since, although it was possible by the latter route to proceed as far as the river Huanuco, both canoes and boatmen had been wanted since the year 1783, when the Indians were removed to the banks of the river Patayrrhondos, where a town was built, and named Playa Grande;—I resolved to open, and traced out accordingly, in the above year, a road from Huanuco to that town; giving notice, that from its haven the descent to the Maranon, or river of the Amazons, might be effected in ten days; that the traveller might proceed thence to the mouth of the Ucayali in four days; and that he might ascend in less than twenty to the Manoa settlements. I have prosecuted with much industry the opening of the above road, during the five years of my government; and this undertaking having at length been successfully accomplished, a portion of mountainous territory, of extreme fertility, and of the extent of upwards of nineteen leagues, has been gained, to the great advantage of the inhabitants of Huanuco, at the same time that the means have been afforded to commence the restoration of the Manoa missions, as has been related with clearness and precision by the authors of the Peruvian Mercury, in the narrative of the travels which have just been concluded by the Huallaga and Ucayali.