FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179  
180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   >>   >|  
remely good and very well flavored. All Peru and a great part of Chile are supplied with this liquor from the Vale of Yca. The common brandy is called _Aguardiente de Pisco_, because it is shipped at that port. A kind of brandy of superior quality, and much dearer, made from Muscatel grapes, is called _Aguardiente de Italia_. It is distinguished by a very exquisite flavor. Very little wine is made at Yca. In some plantations they make a thick dark-brown kind, which is very sweet, and much liked by the Peruvians, though not very agreeable to a European palate. Only one planter, Don Domingo Elias,[49] the richest and most speculative cultivator on the whole coast, makes wine in the European manner. It is very like the wine of Madeira and Teneriffe, only it is more fiery, and contains a more considerable quantity of alcohol. Specimens which have been sent to Europe have obtained the unqualified approbation of connoisseurs. The flavor is considerably improved by a long sea voyage. The brandy, which is exported by sea, is put into large vessels made of clay, called _botijas_. In form they are like a pear, the broad ends being downwards. At the top there is a small aperture, which is hermetically closed with gypsum. The large _botija_ when filled weighs six or seven arobas. Two are a load for a mule. To the pack-saddle, or _aparejo_, two baskets are fastened, in which the _botijas_ are placed with the small ends downwards. These _botijas_ were formerly also used for conveying the brandy across the mountains; but, in consequence of the dangerous, slippery roads, over which the mules often fell, many were broken. Still greater damage was sustained at the springs and wells on the coast, for the poor animals, after their long journeys through the sandy wastes, rushed, on perceiving water, in full flight to the springs. As it happens that there is often room for only five or six mules, and from seventy to eighty were often pressing forward, a great number of the _botijas_ were unavoidably dashed to pieces in spite of all the caution the arrieros could exercise. The annual loss of brandy was immense, and to counteract this evil, bags of goatskin were introduced. These skins are now generally used for the conveyance of brandy across the mountains. The method of skinning the goats is the most horribly cruel that can be conceived. A negro hangs the living animal up by the horns, and makes a circular incision round his neck, which, ho
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179  
180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

brandy

 
botijas
 

called

 
flavor
 
European
 

springs

 

mountains

 

Aguardiente

 
journeys
 
fastened

rushed
 

perceiving

 

aparejo

 

wastes

 

animals

 

baskets

 

conveying

 

slippery

 
consequence
 
broken

sustained

 

dangerous

 

damage

 

greater

 

dashed

 

horribly

 
skinning
 
method
 

introduced

 
generally

conveyance

 
conceived
 

incision

 
circular
 
living
 

animal

 
goatskin
 

pressing

 

eighty

 
forward

number

 

unavoidably

 

seventy

 

flight

 

saddle

 

pieces

 
annual
 

immense

 

counteract

 

exercise