Page:Appleton's Guide to Mexico.djvu/242

214 walk to the Paseo will be found interesting. Large ash-trees (fresnos) grow here, and the gardens are well laid out and planted with flowers. We may add that there are fine cedars and cypress-trees in the yard of the Carmen Church, on the north side of the city.

The traveler may rest a few days in Morelia to advantage. The time may be passed in visiting the other buildings not already mentioned—such as the municipal palace; the cemetery, or campo santo, inclosed with high adobe walls; the smaller churches and vacant convents; the cotton-factory; or some of the colleges and schools.

The climate of Morelia is salubrious. The water is, however, muddy, and must be passed through large stone filters before it can be used.

Morelia was founded on the 23d of April, 1541, by provision of the viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza. During the Spanish domination it received the name of Valladolid, in honor of the Viceroy Mendoza, whose birthplace in Spain bore that name. In 1838 the Legislature of Michoacan enacted that the city should be called Morelia, in memory of José Maria Morelos, a hero of the War of Independence, who was born in this place.

Many excursions can be made from Morelia, especially to the mining districts lying to the east and southeast. Chapatuato is sixty miles by trail. Gold is found in a fissure-vein, associated with galena, pyrites, and antimonial ores. The country rock is slate. Ozumatlan is thirty miles distant. Here gold occurs in trachyte. Sinda lies at about the same distance from Morelia, and its minerals are similar to those just mentioned. In the autumn of 1880 a company was formed in New York to develop these mining regions. It was known as the Michoacan Syndicate. Mining engineers were sent to Mexico from New York, and a favorable report was published, from which the above particulars are taken. Labor is abundant