The hotel in which our friends were lodged is also on the great square, directly opposite the old house of Montejo, which was the first building to which the youths gave special attention. Most of the buildings fronting the square are of more than one story; in fact, the best architecture of the place may be said to be in that neighborhood. The Casa Municipal is an imposing building of two stories, with broad porticos supported on arches. It has a high tower, from which watchmen are supposed to be constantly on the lookout for fires; though, owing to the material used in the construction of Merida, and the absence of stoves and furnaces, fires are of exceedingly rare occurrence.
MUNICIPAL PALACE AND SQUARE, MERIDA.
"The first thing to attract our attention as we strolled through the streets," wrote Fred, "was the dress of the people. The men—I am speaking of the native Indians—wear cotton trousers, or drawers, which are tight at the waist, and descend to the knee or below it. Sometimes they have shirts on their backs and sometimes none; but in the latter case a man is reasonably certain to have one folded away in his hat, to be worn on state occasions or when the rules of society demand. Some of them wear a long shirt and no trousers, and altogether the wardrobe of a native of the lower class is not costly. Frequently we see men with one leg of the trousers rolled up and the other hanging down, and it is a comical sight when a half a dozen thus arrayed are grouped together. A very noticeable feature about the shirt is that it is worn with the 'flaps' outside, like a carter's frock or 'jumper,' and not inside, as in northern countries.
"The dress of the women is a skirt hanging from the waist to the ground, and a white uipil, or outer garment, that hangs from the shoulders to the ground, like a loose wrapper. It is the traditional dress of 300 years ago, and the fashion has not changed at all in that time. On Sundays and feast days both sexes are arrayed in spotless white, but on other days their garments are apt to be more or less dingy. Compared to the Mexicans, the Yucateos, as the people of Yucatan are called, are wonderfully cleanly in their dress and ways, and it is as rare to see a dirty Yucateco as it is to see a clean Aztec. The uipil of the women has short sleeves, and is not as high in the neck as the close-fitted dress of New England, but is a modest and neat-looking dress, and the whiteness of the material makes a fine contrast with the dark skin of the wearer.
DANCING SCENE.
"Many of the women are pretty, and we do not wonder that the Spanish conquerors were loud in their praises of the comeliness of the feminine part of the inhabitants of Yucatan. Their eyes are black as coals, and their sight is as sharp as that of the traditional Indian everywhere; altogether the people have a close resemblance to the Malay race, and we have but to close our eyes a moment to imagine ourselves once more in Batavia or Singapore.