Adventures in Peru, Preface

Prodgers’ Preface to Peru

Appreciation, it is said, is the sauce of life. This being so, it is incumbent on me to return grateful thanks to all those kind-hearted folk who extended so warm a welcome to my initial venture on the troubled sea of Literature. The reception accorded to Adventures in Bolivia has encouraged me to inflict another series of yarns on a long-suffering public. If they serve to pass the time along pleasantly I shall be more than pleased. All the same they may, perhaps, induce folk to take a livelier interest in lands that are a closed book to the majority of my countrymen. That would be indeed grand; for Peru and Bolivia, besides offering great scope for people who have their heads screwed on the right way, also hold out inducements to sufferers who have found European Medical methods ineffectual. So many letters have reached me from all quarters of the globe, thanking me for calling attention to the wonderful healing properties of the various medicinal waters of Peru and Bolivia, that I have felt constrained to give particulars of additional instances where Jura has proved a godsend to pilgrims weary of earth and burdened with complaints that made life a mockery. The knowledge that several of my readers have already benefited by taking my advice, is extremely gratifying. I have also been delighted to receive proofs of the interest awakened in the ancient inhabitants of the region covered by my book. At the special request of a number of readers, I have included in the present volume a very brief sketch of the Incas, compiled from the best authorities, and supplemented by information supplied by my good friends Father Francisco, Hernandez, Father Ambrose, Simon Cruz, and many others.

—C. H. Prodgers.

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