Burke in the Land of Silver

by Tom Williams

  ‘What do they eat?’ asked William.

  ‘They scavenge the dead,’ Burke told him.

  ‘They’re following us.’

  ‘We’d best remember not to die, then.’

  It had been hot in the valley, but, already, Burke was noticing the chill of the air. He called to the guide to stop, so that he could unpack his greatcoat from one of the bundles of baggage hanging precariously from the mules’ saddles. Apala, though, insisted that they press on.

  ‘Soon we must stop. We cannot wait for the cold and dark before we make our camp. We will stop in less than an hour. There will be time for you to dress more warmly then.’

  For another mile, they climbed still more steeply, the track doubling back on itself as they made their way up the mountain. At last it levelled off and, rounding a rocky ridge, they saw a patch of level ground with a shallow stream splashing across the rocky surface.

  ‘Here we will camp,’ their guide announced. Their porters set to unloading the tents, unused on their travel across the plains. Soon, the sound of mallets on tent pegs was echoing from the rocks as they did their best to secure their guy ropes in the stony soil.

  Burke had freed his greatcoat from one of the baggage rolls but, as the sun vanished below the peaks, he felt himself shiver. ‘We need a fire.’

  Apala shrugged. ‘Of course, señor. But first I will have to collect something for us to burn.’

  Burke looked about him. There were no trees, not even any shrubs. The only greenery in sight was occasional clumps of what looked like moss clinging to some of the rocks.

  He watched, astonished, as Apala strode to the nearest of these mossy clumps and tugged at it. Beneath the green coating some straggly wooden stems grew down into cracks in the stone. Burke heard them snap and realised that they were dry and brittle.

  ‘They will not burn for long,’ said his guide. ‘We will need a lot. Do you want to come and help me collect it?’

  Though he was tired from his day in the saddle, Burke was more than happy to explore the area around their camp. He remounted and set off with Apala, leading one of the pack mules with them. Every time that they saw any of the mossy shrub, they would dismount. The young bushes were no use to them but most had at least some older, dry parts that could be ripped from the ground and roped onto the mule’s saddle. Each clump was small, though, and protected by sharp thorns that tore at their hands. It seemed to take for ever to collect enough and it was almost dark when they turned back toward their camp, the mule almost hidden under a great pile of brush.

  The brushwood needed no kindling, burning fast and brilliantly. For several minutes they all huddled round the fire, enjoying the blaze. But, all too soon, the fierce heat was dying and they threw on more wood to protect themselves against the cold of the night. In less than an hour, what had seemed like a huge pile of fuel was almost exhausted. Reluctantly, they abandoned the fire. They took the sheepskins from their saddles to spread on the ground inside their tents and, wrapping themselves in blankets, lay down to sleep.

  James did not sleep well. Several times, he woke and lay shivering in the thin mountain air. At last, the sky began to lighten and he heard the crackle of the flames as porters relit the fire to brew coffee and warm themselves before they started that day’s ride.

  When he left the tent, it was to find that it had snowed during the night. There was only a thin scattering of white on the ground, but it was a reminder of the dangers of travelling this late in the season.

  ‘We must push on hard,’ said Apala. ‘We have to cross the pass before nightfall. It will be too cold to camp up there.’

  The porters were already packing away the tents while James and William sipped at their coffee. Barely an hour after sunrise, they were back on the horses and pushing on up into the mountains.

  There was no snow falling now but, as they climbed, the snow lying on the ground grew thicker. The path rose steeply and, after an hour, the landscape was distinctly wintry. As they neared the pass, the wind, moving through the gap in the mountain range, grew stronger, and the snow covering was blown about. In some places reddish or black rock lay bare to the sky while, in others, the snow was banking to the point where the horses would stumble, unable to see their footing beneath the white covering.

  ‘We can’t stay on the track,’ Apala said.

  He was right. The snow was drifting off the steeper rocks at the side of the track and banking on the path to the point where there was too much danger of a horse falling and breaking its leg. They urged their reluctant mounts from the apparent smoothness of the path onto the ragged rocks alongside it. Though these were steeper and, under other circumstances, would have made for more difficult riding, the snow lay thinly here and the horses could pick their way in comparative safety. Inevitably, though, leaving the path slowed them down and Burke saw Apala casting increasingly worried eyes upward as the day progressed.

  Looking in the same direction, Burke could see nothing. Mist covered the top of the mountains and merged with the snow to make it a blank wilderness of white. He was astonished that their guide could navigate confidently through this emptiness but Apala pushed them on with no hesitation as to their route. His sole concern was that night might fall while they were still too high on the mountain.

  The horses struggled as the snow grew thicker. Sometimes they would stumble in the steeper drifts and everyone would dismount to lead their beasts, which were less likely to fall when relieved of their weight. Climbing through the snow, even for short distances, was exhausting, though. The damp began to leak into Burke’s boots and he found himself panting for breath in the thin air. He longed to rest and make a fire to be warm and dry, if only for a few minutes, but Apala drove them on.

  Now the mountains closed around them and they were struggling through deeper snow, against a wind that howled through the gap between the peaks ahead of them.

  Then the wind fell and Burke was aware that the path was dropping beneath them as steeply as is had been rising before. They were through the pass.

  It was hours before Apala would let them stop, but at last they were clear of the worst of the snow and they pitched their tents once again. As they slipped from their horses, James and William were exhausted. When Apala went in search of fuel for the night’s fire, neither offered to accompany him.

  The next day dawned bright and clear and the spirits of the party rose quickly as they moved easily along the tracks down the mountains. The descent was, if anything, even steeper than the climb from the east and they dropped quickly. By midday, bare rock was already giving way to patches of grass. Tiny blue flowers began to appear and then cacti – first small and gradually larger, until they were passing spiny monsters taller than they were, bright with orange flowers. As they moved further down, myrtle and tamarisk began to fill the air with the smell of spice. It was still cold in the shade but they felt that they were, once again, entering a habitable world.

  They camped for one final night before starting the last part of their descent. By now, the grass was thick enough to use as pasture. Soon after they broke camp they came upon an Indian shepherd driving a herd of llamas to graze beside the track. Burke had heard of llamas, but this was his first chance to observe them at close quarters. He was intrigued by their docility and the extraordinary beauty of their long eyelashes.

  ‘William,’ he decided, ‘when we return, we shall purchase one of these creatures and drive it with the mules. The president of the Royal Society wrote to me asking that I report on the fauna of this region and I am sure he would rather have a living example of such a creature than a mere description.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea, sir?’

  ‘It’s an excellent idea. A collection of animals will distract attention from our primary purpose, it will serve the interests of the Royal Society and, finally, it will enable me to make a contribution to the Duke of York’s private menagerie.’

  ‘Oh well,’ replied William, ‘that’s al
l there is to be said then.’

  James Burke shrugged. That was, indeed, all there was to be said. The Duke of York was unlikely to forget a man who had given him a llama. For an ambitious officer without money, the goodwill of the Duke of York was well worth the inconvenience that the animals might inflict on William.

  James looked at the beasts again. William would be able to manage them. He just hoped they didn’t bite.

  They continued to make their way down toward the Chilean plain. The descent, naturally, was faster than the climb up from La Plata. Their surroundings seemed to change with every hour. The vegetation grew taller and thicker and soon it was warm enough for butterflies to appear, at first in ones and twos but, as their little cavalcade moved downward, rising in their dozens to disappear between the flowers. On this side of the mountain, there was no shortage of rainfall and, for the first time since James had left Buenos Aires he was able to shelter in the shade of the trees growing beside their path. By the afternoon breadfruits, pawpaws, and mare’s tails appeared. They passed a thicket of bamboo: a straggly clump – nothing like he had seen in Haiti. But soon there were more, growing thicker until the groves were filled with stems twice the height of a man. Streams ran alongside the path and waterfalls splashed down from the peaks above them. After the cruel emptiness of the mountains, they felt they were entering paradise.

  Finally, they reached a valley, folded between the hills that still rose on either side. Here they came on their first evidence of cultivation – a patch of earth, laboriously scratched out among the trees and rocks.

  James stopped to examine the plants growing there.

  ‘It’s a bloody potato patch.’ He turned away in disgust. ‘Might as well have stayed in Ireland.’

  Beyond the potatoes, though, another field was covered with leaves amongst which trumpet shaped purple flowers struggled to reach the sun. This time it was William who peered suspiciously at the crop.

  ‘That looks like a nasturtium,’ he said. ‘Only it isn’t.’

  Their guide stepped off the path to join him.

  ‘Mashua,’ he said. ‘Like potato but spicy. But you shouldn’t eat it. It makes you less a man.’

  Apala turned back to the path and set their procession on its way again. Burke and Williams exchanged glances, shrugged, and followed him.

  Barely had they started to move than the track veered around another spinney and they found their way blocked by three black cows. They were on the edge of a village.

  This was no Spanish colonial outpost but an Indian village, such as they had not seen on their journey through La Plata. The houses were made of adobe bricks and smoke rose through their thatched roofs. Beyond the houses, the valley floor was a patchwork of tiny fields where the men could just be seen ploughing with piebald bulls. A woman, her baby in a wicker basket carried on her back, emerged from one of the huts and greeted them solemnly as they passed.

  Spread below them were the fields of Chile. They stopped and looked at the wooded country ahead of them, so different from the plains to the east of the mountains. The smell of spice and damp in the air, the sight of Indians going about their business, cattle roaming in threes and fours instead of in hundreds.

  James looked out over a whole new world. He took a deep breath, enjoying the air of Chile. As always, he was thrilled by the prospect of a new land. New places, new experiences, new people: in novelty, it seemed to him, he could re-invent himself, putting his past behind him.

  ‘I think this was worth the trip,’ he said to William.

  Three weeks later, he was not so sure. When he had persuaded Colonel Taylor to finance the trip, he had promised that he would survey the coast in the south of the country. Though the possibility of a British naval expedition rounding the Horn seemed remote, he had set out intending to deliver on his promise.

  ‘We’ll start at the south and work our way up,’ he airily informed William.

  Now they had been trekking two hundred miles across the Chilean plain with its constant rain, he felt as if he had never left the perpetual damp misery of his Kilkenny childhood. And still they were hundreds of miles from the southern extremity of the country.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ he complained to William. ‘We’re in the middle of nowhere.’

  He spoke the literal truth. For the last two days they had seen no one and the supplies they bought in the last village they passed were running low. ‘Even if the British Army got here safely, what would they do? Any landing is going to have to be made in the north.’

  ‘There’s Talcahuano, sir.’

  James sighed. Sometimes he wished that William was not quite so efficient. He had hoped to forget Talcahuano.

  ‘Yes, Brown, there is Talcahuano.’ He sighed again. ‘Very well, Talcahuano it is. But no further.’

  So Talcahuano marked the southernmost point of the expedition. It was, Burke had to admit, worth the effort.

  Although it had only been recognised as a port by the Chilean government less than fifty years earlier, a visit showed it to be flourishing. Half a dozen ships stood at anchor in the enormous bay, protected from any storms off the Pacific by a peninsular jutting northward. They saw whaling ships flying the flag of the United States, as well as Spanish merchant vessels whose crews filled the dockside taverns, readying themselves to face the rigours of a passage round the Horn. William spent a couple of evenings drinking with crew on shore leave and confirmed what James already believed. Talcahuano was the last decent harbour before the Magellan Straits. Any naval attack on Chile would need to make its first landfall here. James was happy enough with that prospect. A few days spent walking around the bay confirmed his first impression that its size made it impossible to defend. The entrance was too wide for any shore-based batteries to threaten ships out in the channel and a vast army would have to be tied down to protect all the possible landing sites along the shore. The Spaniards, sensibly in James’ opinion, had decided that only a token presence was worthwhile. There wasn’t even a proper fort – just a barracks, where a hundred or so troops represented the sole military force.

  Satisfied with what he had learned, James led his caravan north. They moved slowly up the coast, stopping at every town they found. Burke would send William out with a butterfly net to encourage the idea that he was simply another European anxious to record the wonders of the New World for the learned societies of Paris and Berlin. It left him free to sketch, although far more of his sketches featured such Spanish fortifications as they came across than recorded the beauties of Chilean wildlife.

  By the time they had worked their way back to Valparaiso, almost three hundred miles to the north, Burke was sick of the sea. The weather, though still mild, continued to be wet and the succession of small ports and even smaller villages between them had lost any charm it might once have had. He decided that they would spend the rest of the winter in Santiago. So the little caravan turned away from the sea and back toward the Andes that they had crossed almost ten weeks earlier.

  Only when the mountains were looming over them did they finally arrive at the nominal capital of the province of La Plata.

  James knew that Santiago was a relatively small place, overtaken by cities on the east of the continent, which offered easier sea routes to Spain. Even so, it was a disappointment. It was laid out on the same rigid grid pattern as Buenos Aires – a design that made only the smallest of concessions to the mighty Mapocho river which ran through its centre. The arrow straight streets and elegant squares, which were so impressive in Buenos Aires, looked stunted and ridiculous in this little town under the mountains. The only building that might have interested James was the mint – a palatial two-storey affair built around a central courtyard where orange trees promised that summer would come eventually. However, even this failed to live up to its promise. Parts were still scaffolded, with workmen dabbing paint brushes half-heartedly at the new plasterwork. William had, as usual, explored the local taverns to pick up what titbits he could, less bec
ause James thought there would be anything useful to learn as for want of something better to do.

  ‘They’ve been building that place for the last twenty years,’ he told James. ‘I think some of them are hoping to spin it out until their grandkids can take over.’

  After less than two months, James and William felt they had both walked every one of the streets a hundred times. Rain or no rain, it was time to be off.

  The presence of the mint was a tangible reminder of the reason for the area’s importance. If Britain was to be able to come to some well-founded view on the value of Spain’s American possessions, it needed to know how much silver there was. So the focus of the expedition moved from Chile’s military defences to its mineral worth.

  They started with a return to the coastal plain but a month spent surveying the geology of the lowlands confirmed what Burke’s masters in London already suspected: there was no silver there. The Spaniards’ wealth came from Upper Peru and the near-legendary silver mines of Potosí. It was time to move north.

  Soon they had left behind them the lush green of the farmlands and vineyards of the coastal plain and were entering the rocky desert of Atacama.

  Even Burke’s enthusiasm for new places was dented by the harshness of the world they now found themselves in. They had added three llamas to their mule train and all of the animals were loaded down with water, but still they had to ration their drinks in that great expanse of nothingness. The odd patch of scrubby grass made it through the rock, but everywhere they looked there was a glare of white stone reflecting the sun. Though full summer was still months off, the days were remorselessly hot. At night, though, they would shiver as the temperature fell toward freezing. It seemed almost as cold as it had been in the Andes. As he shivered in the morning chill, Burke remembered the fires that had thawed them out in the mountains. Here, their firewood had run out days ago and, in all that vast emptiness, there was no growing thing that could replace it.