A fortnight or more has passed in severe toil;[180-3] but not more
severe than they have endured many a time before. Bidding farewell once
and forever to the green ocean of the eastern plains, they have crossed
the Cordillera; they have taken a longing glance at the city of Santa
Fe, lying in the midst of rich gardens on its lofty mountain plateau,
and have seen, as was to be expected, that it was far too large a place
for any attempt of theirs. But they had not altogether thrown away their
time. Their Indian lad[181-4] has discovered that a gold-train is going
down from Santa Fe toward the Magdalena; and they are waiting for it
beside the miserable rut which serves for a road, encamped in a forest
of oaks which would make them almost fancy themselves back again in
Europe, were it not for the tree-ferns which form the undergrowth; and
were it not, too, for the deep gorges opening at their very feet; in
which, while their brows are swept by the cool breezes of a temperate
zone, they can see far below, dim through their everlasting vapor-bath
of rank hot steam, the mighty forms and gorgeous colors of the tropic
forest.

They have pitched their camp among the tree-ferns, above a spot where
the path winds along a steep hill-side, with a sheer cliff below of many
a hundred feet. There was a road there once, perhaps, when
Cundinamarca[181-5] was a civilized and cultivated kingdom; but all
which Spanish misrule has left of it are a few steps slipping from their
places at the bottom of a narrow ditch of mud. It has gone the way of
the aqueducts, and bridges, and post-houses, the gardens and the
llama-flocks of that strange empire. In the mad search for gold, every
art of civilization has fallen to decay, save architecture alone; and
that survives only in the splendid cathedrals which have risen upon the
ruins of the temples of the Sun.

And now, the rapid tropic vegetation has reclaimed its old domains, and
Amyas and his crew are as utterly alone, within a few miles of an
important Spanish settlement, as they would be in the solitudes of the
Orinoco or the Amazon.

In the meanwhile, all their attempts to find sulphur and nitre have been
unavailing; and they have been forced to depend after all (much to
Yeo's[182-6] disgust) upon their swords and arrows. Be it so:
Drake[182-7] took Nombre de Dios and the gold-train there with no better
weapons; and they may do as much.

So, having blocked up the road above by felling a la