s will induce a Quitonian to do any thing or be any
where in season. If there were a railroad in Ecuador, every body would
be too late for the first train. There are only one or two watch-tinkers
in the great city, and, as may be inferred, very few watches are in
running order. As a consequence, the people have very little idea of
time. But this is not the sole reason for their dilatoriness; they are
indifferent. Nobody seems to want to make money (though all are in sad
need of it); nobody is in a hurry; nobody is busy save the tailors, who
manifest a commendable diligence. Contempt for labor, a Spanish
inheritance, and lack of energy, are traits which stand out in _alto
relievo_.

One can form his own judgment of the spiritless people from the single
statement which we have from Dr. Jameson, that during the last forty
years not ten Quitonians have visited the grand crater of Pichincha,
though it is possible to ride horseback to its very edge. Plenty of
gentlemen by profession walk the streets and cathedral terrace, proud as
a Roman senator under his toga, yet not ashamed to beg a cup of coffee
at the door of a more fortunate fellow-citizen. Society is in a constant
struggle between ostentation and want.

Nature has done more for Ecuador than for Ecuadorians. She laid out this
beautiful valley for an Elysian field; "de Quito al Cielo" (from Quito
to Heaven) is not an empty adage; and it is painful to look upon
tottering walls and impassable roads, upon neglected fields and an idle
population--poor as poverty in the lap of boundless natural wealth. The
only really live man in the republic is the president, Senor G. Garcia
Moreno, a man of wide views and great energy, standing in these respects
head and shoulders above his fellow-citizens. Quito and Quito Valley owe
nearly all their improvements to this one man.

It is easy to say what would be the industry of a people who spend much
of their time repeating traditions of treasures buried by the Incas, and
stories of gold deposits in the mountains. Of commerce there is scarcely
enough to deserve the name. Quito is an ecclesiastical city, and is
nearly supported by Guayaquil. Without capital, without energy, without
business habits, Quitonians never embark in grand commercial schemes
and industrial enterprises. There is not a highway for commerce in any
direction, only a natural path (called by the innocent natives a road),
which rises to the altitude of fourteen thousand