The church was small, and, like that of Cunen, built at the right of an older and much more extensive edifice now shattered by earthquakes and used only as a burial-place. We climbed the bell-tower and found one bell with the date 1683, another with that of 1773; all were bound to the supporting crossbeams by raw-hide thongs. The chief ornament of the Plaza was an ancient Ceiba-tree (Eriodendron) of immense size and traditionary antiquity. Below the terrace of the Plaza was a court, in which a fountain of odd design furnished water for the town. Animals were fed here over the gravestones that paved the court, and Frank remarked that in an earthquake country people chose stable ground for their graves. Our photographing attracted such a crowd that we walked away to the ruined bridge. Originally this was nine feet wide and about two hundred and fifty feet long. Its age we could not learn; but a large sand-box tree (Hura crepitans) seven and a half feet in circumference had grown up in the very midst of the paved approach, tearing up the stone floor with its slow, irresistible power, and another large tree of the fig family was persistently fingering the cracks in the ancient wall. The tiles used in the arches were thin like those in old Roman structures, and the mortar was generally harder than the terra-cotta. Frank sketched the bridge, and we followed in thought the river until it became the Rio de la Pasion, then as the Usumacinta (the ancient Rio de los Lacandones) flowing through the richest land and most genial climate, by the ruins of the ancient cities of the earliest men, and among the villages of the unconquered tribes to the shores of that Bay of Campeachy where Votan gave his laws to the children of the forest.
Even in this retired spot we became an attraction to the unemployed on this Sunday afternoon; and we slowly sauntered back to the cabildo, measuring on our way the trunk of a dead ceiba-tree forty feet in circumference above the buttresses. A game of ball was going on under the tree in the Plaza. Wooden balls five inches in diameter, not very round, were shoved about with paddles. In the evening two young men, at the request of the comandante, played on the flute and guitar for us a number of Spanish airs.
In all these towns the carcél, or prison, is simply a room in the cabildo with grated windows and door, and separate rooms are often, but not always, provided for women. We saw but few occupants in the prisons of the towns we passed through.
We made exceedingly comfortable beds of the public documents in the register’s office, and I must confess to reading one of these marriage-records, which, as usual, was entered with great particularity, filling a folio page. Comfortable as this “marriage bed” was, we were in the saddle the next morning at five o’clock; and leaving our adios for the kind comandante, followed the river bank for some distance in the mist. Not half a league from the town we came to a ruined church of considerable size, evidently shattered by earthquakes. Our path led directly through a campo santo, and even over the graves, which were usually covered with tiles crossed and edged with white paint.
We crossed the dry bed of a river,—certainly at some seasons difficult to ford,—and came upon a good level path extending along the river side for a mile; and then by a sudden turn we climbed out of the valley up a steep hill of decomposing rock, coming to a grassy plain on the top. There we met Indios loaded with pottery,—some with huge cántaras of red clay so large that two made a load; others with twelve fifteen-inch spherical pots, all of good workmanship.[13] The water by the roadside was all whitish, and not inviting. The highest part of the pass was 6,250 feet; only a few hundred feet below it we found a beautiful liliaceous plant, and some of the mozos we passed carried superb clusters of a purple orchid which we afterwards found parasitic on trees. Another valley and another steep gravelly slope to nearly eight thousand feet, and then we had a view over a vast extent of mountainous country. No lake or river relieved the thirsty landscape, though rain-clouds hung on the horizon and dropped their showers in the far west. Corn was in tassel; and where we rested at noon on a high plateau, 7,825 feet, we found it in milk. There we saw the maguey used as a hedge-plant,—and a very impervious fence it made. From this high land there was a gradual descent towards the south. Far away to the left we saw the church of San Pedro, surrounded by its little adobe village, and soon we caught a glimpse of the still-distant Santa Cruz del Quiché, high enough, but seemingly in a valley, for mountains like the hills about Jerusalem guarded it on every side. The soil near the road was very thin, and covered what seemed to be indurated tufa. Deep pools of water were formed in this hard substance.
As we came at last, after a hard day’s ride, into the uninteresting town, we found the streets all carefully named, as Avenida de Barrios, salida por Mejico (Barrios Street, the way to Mexico),—which was as useful as it would be to put a sign on the corner of Broadway, “Cortland Street, the way to Philadelphia.” All the inhabitants seemed to be in the Plaza, listening to a band and watching some fair acrobats who tumbled on mats and swung on a horizontal bar. After waiting some time before the locked doors of the Hotel del Centro, the proprietor came home and let us in. Tough meat, frijoles, bread, and tolerable chocolate were all we could get; and the vile dogs were even more troublesome than usual. Our beds were made up in the dining-room, and we had pillows and sheets again,—the only good things this posada afforded.
THE PLAZA OF SACAPULAS.
The morning was overcast; but Frank and I walked to the campo santo, nearly a mile from town. High walls of adobe surrounded it, and a locked gate kept us out; but we peered in over the heaps of white lilies (Lilium candidum) and marigolds offered at the entrance, and saw masonry tombs of very bizarre forms, some painted white, others red and blue, or blue and white, in checks. The meadows all around were intersected by wide ditches which we had no little trouble in crossing, the bare legs of the natives rendering bridges quite unnecessary. When one was beyond our jump we threw in the washing-stones on the bank until we had enough for stepping-stones. Returning to town, we paid our respects to the Jefe politico, Don Antonio Rivera, who is a young man exceedingly polite and obliging, and we found practice made it much easier to converse than when we met the Governor of Coban. Don Antonio showed us fine specimens of the woods of his neighborhood which had been prepared for an exhibition in Guatemala City; but he could not tell us the names, and sent for an old Indio who was better informed. This Indio also served to show us what the Jefe evidently considered a very amusing garment,—his trousers, which were in the usual black woollen jerga, cut up in front as high as mid thigh, so that they can be rolled up behind when the wearer girds up his loins to work. Cloths of various kinds were brought in for our inspection, and the prices given. These seemed high, for the material is only a vara (thirty-three inches) wide, and is sold in vara lengths. Not satisfied with showing us all that the market afforded, the kind Jefe furnished us with a guide to the ancient city of Utatlan, or Gumarcaah, and a mozo to carry my photographic kit.
A walk of three long miles westward brought us to a great disappointment. It is human to like what one has not got; Americans have an extreme respect for ruins, and we were no exception to the mass of our countrymen.