Page:Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan.djvu/392

314 whose history we are ignorant, man's hand has been against his fellow. The solitary Indian hut is all that now occupies the site of the ancient city; but on Good Friday of every year a solemn procession of the whole Indian population is made to it from the village of Tecpan Guatimala, and, as our guide told us, on that day bells are heard sounding under the earth.

Descending by the same narrow passage, we traversed the ravine, and ascended on the other side. Our guide put us into the road that avoided the town, and we set off on a gallop.

Don Saturnino possessed the extremes of good temper, simplicity, uprightness, intelligence, and perseverance. Ever since I fell in with him he had been most useful, but this day he surpassed himself; and he was so well satisfied with us as to declare that if it were not for his wife in Costa Rica, he would bear us company to Palenque. He had an engagement in Guatimala on a particular day; every day that he lost with us was so much deducted from his visit to his relatives; and at his earnest request we had consented to pass a day with them, though a little out of our road We reached the molino in time to walk over the mill. On the side of the hill above was a large building to receive grain, and below it an immense reservoir for water in the dry season, but which did not answer the purpose intended. The mill had seven sets of grindstones, and working night and day, ground from seventy to ninety negases of wheat in the twenty-four hours, each negas being six arobas of twenty-five pounds. The Indians bring the wheat, and each one takes a stone and does his own grinding, paying a rial (sixpence halfpenny) per negas for the use of the mill. Flour is worth about from fourteen to sixteen shillings the barrel.

Don Saturnino was one of the best men that ever lived, but in undress there was a lankness about him that was ludicrous. In the evening, as he sat on the bed with his thin arms wound around his thin legs, and we reproved him for his sacrilegious act in cutting open the cotton cloth, his little eyes twinkled, and Mr. C. and I laughed as we had not before laughed in Central America.

But in that country one extreme followed close upon another. At midnight we were roused from sleep by that movement which, once felt, can never be mistaken. The building rocked, our men in the corridor cried out, "temblor," and Mr. C. and I at the same moment exclaimed, "an earthquake!" Our catres stood transversely. By the undulating movement of the earth he was rolled from side to side, and I from head to foot. The sinking of my head induced an awful faintness of heart. I sprang upon my feet, and rushed to the door. In a moment the earth was still. We sat on the sides of the bed,