MR. LEDGER'S ALPACA EXPEDITION

INTO BOLIVIA.

FEW

EW travels, in any age or by any person, could be more worthy of record, or more interesting, than the account of Mr. Ledger's attempt to introduce the Alpaca from Bolivia into Australia. But, so far as I know, the materials for doing justice to the case are wanting. The last I heard of him was about 1860. At that time he was in Australia, and he wrote to me saying that he was about to prepare a work on the subject. He had given a lecture in Valparaiso on the main points, at the Literary and Scientific Society, in the year 1858, when I was honorary secretary, and Mr. William Lloyd, the chief engineer of the Chilian railways, was president. Mr. Ledger and Mr. Savage who was for some time. his companion, gave me certain sketches made during the expedition, and I have four of these made up neatly in water colours, now at Hincaster House; and they are perhaps the only remains of a most interesting and wonderful adventure. Mr. Ledger had been supported by Mr. Waddington and one or two very wealthy gentlemen in Chile, and finally I, and another friend or two, put a few pounds sterling into the hands of Mr. Ledger to ease his progress, after he had come near to the end of his great labours. One of the sketches above named I shall attach to these remarks in the shape of a photograph. The expedition lasted over many years, and finally, in 1858, some 336 animals were put on board at Caldera, in Chile, for Australia, and apart from many heavy. costs incurred in former years, Mr. Waddington insured the animals for $80,000, or about £16,000 sterling.

Amongst papers Mr. Ledger gave me in Chile, and notes I made of his conversations in Valparaiso, I find material for the few details which are now put together. What became of Mr. Ledger after his visit to Australia has never come to

my knowledge, but notwithstanding all his efforts, I fear that the animals, though bred and nursed for placing them in safe pastures in Australia, must have found the climate unsuitable, or more in the past thirty years would have been heard of them.

I may mention here, before giving more of Mr. Ledger's own words, that the llama, the alpaca, and vicuña are sometimes spoken of as if the same animals, but this is not so. The true llama is very much a beast of burden, and has done an immense lot of carrying over all the wild and desert places known in Peru and Bolivia. Perhaps one of the first accounts we have of its existence is that Pizarro, in the spring of 1528, bade adieu to Panama, taking with him two or three llamas,-Indians,-vases of gold and silver, as vouchers to the court of Spain of his wonderful discoveries. Mr. Savage, who was with Mr. Ledger in a portion of his travels in Bolivia, and who gave me sundry sketches of the expedition, told me as follows:

"Ledger has been nearly six years exclusively occupied in this undertaking, having first gone to Australia from Peru to learn for himself the fitness of that country for rearing and breeding these valuable domestic animals. Finding it suitable, he returned to South America and succeeded, after a long time, in getting 8oo animals, with which he crossed the Bolivian frontier into the Argentine Republic, after innumerable difficulties, dangers, and hardships. Of those 800 only 50 remained in 1858 to be embarked. The rest of the number finally shipped were either born on the march or bought afterwards in small flocks, and brought over to the others at great trouble and delay. After crossing the Bolivian boundary into the Argentine provinces, he crept along the east slope of the Andes to about 26° south, then crossing this chain of mountains, and the Cordillera of the coast, arrived at Copiapó, where the animals remained during the fitting up of the vessel. In this, his latest passage of the mountains, he was pretty successful, but forty animals perished in a snow storm. Mr. Ledger has done more than this, he has proved the possibility of cross-breeding between the llama and alpaca to advantage. In two generations it is almost impossible to distinguish between the wool of the cross-breed and that of the pure alpaca, whilst the cross-breed, called the huaricho, has the advantage in size, strength, robustness of

constitution, and less delicacy in its choice of food,—qualities derived from its mother, the llama. The alpaca, in its native state, eats only marsh grass of the valleys, and the llama eats the coarse, but nourishing, grasses of the mountain side. The cross-breed eats from either, but prefers the common pasture grass.

Ledger also captured, whilst young, and domesticated them, nine vicuñas, which, having been suckled by llamas, will breed with them. This being done on the march was a great undertaking."

In the notes given to me by Mr. Ledger, he says that Joseph Hegan, Esquire, so far back as 1828, dedicated his exertions to obtaining the wool of the alpaca. The first alpaca wool that arrived in England was an unfortunate business, and many years elapsed before its qualities were appreciated. After that a long time elapsed before more was shipped, but several small lots of animals were sent to England, yet with little success. Mr. Ledger began to think that the only way to success was to train the animal before removing it from its native home. With that object he rented, with the help of others, an estate in the centre of the Cordilleras, and began his hard task. In 1845 the Peruvian Government passed a law to prevent the exportation. In 1850 a vessel arrived from Sydney, the owners not being aware of the prohibition, and application was made by Messrs. Boardman and Dickson to the Peruvian Government for permission to ship 400 animals, but they were referred to the decree of 1845.

It is a strange fact that not a single estate owner breeds the animal; it is bred by Indians only, who are very jealous of their masters rearing them. Mr. Ledger meant to give details of this jealousy in a work he meditated, but what has become of him or the documents I know not.

His first expedition was in 1851, to get the animals from Bolivia, of which he said the causes of failure were better known to those engaged with him than to himself. In 1852 he got a flock together, but finally left to go to Australia and see if the conditions of rearing and breeding were there. He took a native with him, and after they had satisfied themselves that the project was a wise one, they returned to Valparaiso in 1853. After five and a half years of incessant toil and immense suffering, he arrived with 421 animals into

Chile, in April, 1857. The greater part of the country over which they travelled was totally unfit for the animals, in many parts there not being a blade of grass or a drop of water for thirty leagues together. They travelled on foot with the animals more than 450 leagues, passed three higher and five lower ranges of Cordilleras, and in snow, hail, and rain without intermission for nearly six months in the year, and the other six months complete hurricanes by day and night, it was their fate to contend with. No tent could stand against the wind, snow, and hail which they met with. This animal we are concerned with was formerly an object of adoration to the Indians, and was attended to by the Vestals of the Temples of the Sun in Cuzco. They were followed at times for days by beldames, crying and screaming after them for taking the animal away. The Indians are a poor, timid race, but kindness will do much for them. "I cannot forget for a moment how much I owe to some of them, yet they could not understand the motive I had in leaving home, and wife, and children for some six years; but they stuck to me, and fought for me when a price was set on my head for its presentation in any province of Bolivia. I never had to punish a single man. Of course, at times, I had a large number of paid helpers, but they had but few disputes amongst themselves, and they and my head men, or mayordomos, identified themselves with me, and no inducements could take them from me." He then speaks kindly of the solace Mr. Savage was to him after November, 1856, making an all but unendurable life bearable, by enlivening the long and dreary nights when all seemed desperate. This gentleman made the sketches which it was his intention to use as illustrations to a book of his travels. But whether any were spared, besides those at Hincaster House, is very doubtful. One of these sketches, of Laguna Blanca, 10,000 feet above sea level, on the east slopes of the Andes, I publish with these short notes.

On this sketch, just below, but in view of the everlasting snows, are written, in Ledger's words: "I arrived with 421 animals across the high pass of the Cordilleras, into Chile, April, 1858, since when I have lost 50 animals, from forced marches and trials to which we were subjected, not only to save the remainder, but also to save ourselves from total destruction in snow storms." This sketch shows Mr. Ledger

and one of his mayordomos, and a number of the animals, the alpacas, llamas, and vicuñas being shown at rest.

A second sketch is of a snowstorm in the higher range, and bears the following words: "Before the storm was at its height we sent out two Indians to bring in fuel; they were never seen alive again. When the snow had somewhat melted away, we found their bodies half uncovered, being guided to the spot by vultures."

This sketch shows the vultures around the lost men, and others in search of their comrades, in a country of precipitous rocks, amongst the eternal snows, and gives a graphic view, more than words can give, to those who have not been in such regions.

A third sketch is taken at a place called Ramadilla, on which it reads thus: 66 It is now twelve years since I first thought of carrying out this speculation, and ten since I rented an estate in Peru and Bolivia, and learned the practical breeding of the animal. I had once 1,200 animals on the route, of which, from being overdriven, sickness, and casualties only 50 remain. We have often had to take them 30 leagues at once, without a blade of grass or a drop of water to be got."

This sketch is on the side of rugged mountains, just below the summit of the Andes, and the men are under tents, the animals, a large number of them, at rest. The men are preparing food at a camp fire, and others are unloading or loading the donkeys, giving a very picturesque idea of the work. Numbers of the animals are seen coming towards them from a distant plain, and the scene is very lively.

A fourth sketch is of a rugged district, where a river, after running along a plain, is rushing between precipitous sides, the river having to be crossed; zigzag roads are cut in the vertical rock on one side, with just room for one animal to pass at once. The alpacas are already over, and the donkeys are in the act of coming from the heights to the river, laden in the customary way, with packs, perhaps of about sixty or seventy pounds each, one fastened to each side of a donkey. Three men are on mules, or donkeys, though they are more often mules where I dub them otherwise, on the heights looking over the distance, as if watching the alpacas. There are indications of grass on the lower land, near the river, and immense specimens of the cactus, perhaps thirty or more feet