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Rh majestic peak of Orizaba is visible only from the eastern end of the city. An intervening ridge prevents the observer from seeing it in other quarters of the town. If the tourist will leave his hotel early enough to see the sun rise on the mountain, he will behold one of the grandest sights in Mexico.

Most of the houses in Orizaba are one story high, with overhanging red-tiled roofs. The traveler will have a chance to examine the class of dwellings occupied by the poor people. They are constructed of all kinds of rubbish, such as old boards, sugar-cane stalks, barrel-staves, sun-dried bricks, and pieces of matting. These huts are generally thatched with palm-leaves or with dried strips of the maguey, and the solid ground serves as a floor. The climate of Orizaba is temperate but very moist. Bull-fights take place on Sunday afternoons, the bull-ring, or plaza de toros, being in an old convent. Another large church is now used as a barracks for the garrison. There is a Masonic lodge in the upper part of the same edifice.

The stranger, by visiting the registrar's office (oficio publico mas antiguo), can inspect some of the old Spanish deeds written on parchment, with many abbreviations, during the time of Cortes. The mediæval Spanish contains so many contractions as to be almost incomprehensible to the Mexican of to-day. For example, instead of writing q-u-e for the word que, meaning "which," in those days they wrote simply the letter q, with the addition of a semicircular curve, which was carried over to the first letter of the next word, giving the two words the appearance of a single one. Notwithstanding the age of these manuscripts, they are still in an excellent state of preservation.

Leaving Orizaba, the railroad traverses the flat plain, and passes the village of Horales, which boasts of a small