A DON QUIXOTE.

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ing out like a pump-handle, the hand dropping from the wrist, and shaking with the movement of the mule. He rode on a Mexican saddle plated with silver, and carried behind a pair of alforgas with bread and cheese, and atole, a composition of pounded parched corn, cocoa, and sugar, which, mixed with water, was almost his living. His mozo was as fat as he was lean, and wore a bell-crowned straw hat, cotton shirt, and drawers reaching down to his knees. Excepting that instead of Rosinante and the ass the master rode a mule and the servant went afoot, they were a genuine Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, the former of which appellations, very early in our acquaintance, we gave to Don Saturnino.

We set out for Quezaltenango, but intended to turn aside and visit ruins, and that day we went three leagues out of our road to say farewell to our friend Padre Alcantra at Ciudad Vieja.

At five o'clock in the afternoon we reached the convent, where I had the pleasure of meeting again Padre Alcantra, Señor Vidaury, and Don Pepé, the same party with whom I had passed the day with so much satisfaction before. Mr. Catherwood had in the mean time passed a month at the convent. Padre Alcantra

had fled at the approach of the tyrant Morazan; Don Pepé had had a shot at him as he was retreating from the Antigua, and the padre had a musket left at night by a flying soldier against the wall of the convent.

The morning opened with troubles. The gray mule was sick. Don Saturnino bled her on both sides of her neck, but the poor animal was not in a condition to be ridden. Shortly afterward Mr. Catherwood had one of the mozos by the throat, but Padre Alcantra patched up a peace. Don Saturnino said that the gray mule would

be better for exercise, and for the last time we bade farewell to our kind host.

Don Pepé escorted us, and crossing the plain of El Vieja in the direction in which Alvarado entered it, we ascended a high hill, and, turning the summit, through a narrow opening looked down upon a beautiful plain, cultivated like a garden, which opened to the left as we advanced, and ran off to the Lake of Duenos, between the two great volcanoes of Fire and Water. Descending to the plain, we entered the vil lage of San Antonio, occupied entirely by Indians. The cura's house stood on an open plaza, with a fine fountain in front, and the huts of the Indians were built with stalks of sugarcane. Early in the occupation of Guatimala, the lands around the capital were partitioned out among certain canonigos, and Indians were allotted to cultivate them. Each village was called by the canonigo's own name. A church was built, and a fine house for himself, and by judicious management the Indians became settled and the artisans for the capital. In the stillness and quiet of the village, it seemed as if the mountains and volcanoes around had shielded it from the devastation and alarm of war. Passing through it, on the other side of the plain we commenced ascending a mountain. About half way up, looking back over the village and plain, we saw a single white line over the mountain we had crossed to the Ciudad Vieja, and the range of the eye embraced the plain and lake at our feet, the great plain of Escuintla, the two volcanoes of Agua and Fuego, extending to the Pacific Ocean. The road was very steep, and our mules laboured. On the other side of the mountain the road lay for some distance between shrubs and small trees, emerging from which we saw an immense plain,

A BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY.

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broken by the track of the direct road from Guatimala, and afar off the spires of the town of Chimaltenango. At the foot of the mountain we reached the village of Paramos. We had been three hours and a half making six miles. Don Pepé summoned the alcalde, showed him Carrera's passport, and demanded a guide to the next village. The alcalde called his alguazils, and in a very few minutes a guide was ready. Don Pepé told us that he left us in Europa, and with many thanks we bade him farewell.

We were now entering upon a region of country which, at the time of the conquest, was the most populous, the most civilized, and best cultivated in Guatimala. The people who occupied it were the descendants of those found there by Alvarado, and perhaps four fifths were Indians of untainted blood. For three centuries they had submitted quietly to the dominion of the whites, but the rising of Carrera had waked them up to a recollection of their fathers, and it was rumoured that their eyes rolled strangely upon the white men as the enemies of their race. For the first time we saw fields of wheat and peach-trees. The country was poetically called Europa; and though the Volcano de Agua still reared in full sight its stupendous head, it resembled the finest part of England on a magnificent scale.

But it was not like travelling in England. The young man with whose throat Mr. Catherwood had been so familiar loitered behind with the sick mule and a gun. He had started from Ciudad Vieja with a drawn knife in his hand, the blade about a foot and a half long, and we made up our minds to get rid of him; but we feared that he had anticipated us, and had gone off with the mule and gun. We waited till he came up, relieved him from the gun, and made him go forward,

while we drove the mule. At the distance of two leagues we reached the Indian village of San Andres Isapa. Don Saturnino flourished Carrera's passport, introduced me as El Ministro de Nueva-York, demanded a guide, and in a few minutes an alguazil was trotting before us for the next village. At this village, on the same requisition, the alcalde ran out to look for an alguazil, but could not find one immediately, and ventured to beg Don Saturnino to wait a moment. Don Saturnino told him he must go himself; Carrera would cut off his head if he did not; "the minister of NewYork" could not be kept waiting. Don Saturnino, like many others of my friends in that country, had no very definite notions in regard to titles or places. A man happened to be passing, whom the alcalde pressed into service, and he trotted on before with the halter of the led horse. Don Saturnino hurried him along; as we approached the next village Carrera's soldiers were in sight, returning on the direct road to Guatimala, fresh from the slaughter at Quezaltenango. Don Saturnino. told the guide that he must avoid the plaza and go on to the next village. The guide begged, and Don Saturnino rode up, drew his sword, and threatened to cut his head off. The poor fellow trotted on, with his eye fixed on the uplifted sword; and when Don Saturnino turned to me with an Uncle Toby expression of face, he threw down the halter, leaped over a hedge fence, and ran toward the town. Don Saturnino, not disconcerted, caught up the halter, and, spurring his mule, pushed on. The road lay on a magnificent table-land, in some places having trees on each side for a great distance. Beyond this we had a heavy rain-storm, and late in the afternoon reached the brink of an immense precipice, in which, at a great distance, we

saw the molina or wheat-mill, looking like a NewEngland factory. The descent was very steep and muddy, winding in places close along the precipitous side of the ravine. Great care was necessary with the mules; their tendency was to descend sidewise, which was very dangerous; but in the steepest places, by keeping their heads straight, they would slip in the mud several paces, bracing their feet and without falling.

At dark, wet and muddy, and in the midst of a heavy rain, we reached the molina. The major-domo was a Costa Rican, a countryman of Don Saturnino, and, fortunately, we had a room to ourselves, though it was damp and chilly. Here we learned that Tecpan Guatimala, one of the ruined cities we wished to visit, was but three leagues distant, and the major-domo offered to go with us in the morning.