Page:Incidents of travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan.djvu/427

Rh opening for the face; some wore a sort of turban of red cord plaited with the hair. The bells were hushed, and wooden clappers sounded in their stead. As we rode through, armed to the teeth, the crowd made way in silence. We passed the door of the church, and entered the great gate of the convent. The cura was absent at the moment, but a respectable-looking servant-woman received us in a manner that assured us of a welcome from her master. There was, however, an air of excitement and trepidation in the whole household, and it was not long before the good woman unburdened herself of matters fearfully impressed upon her mind.

After chocolate, we went to the corregidor, to whom we presented our letters from the government and Carrera's passport. He was one of Morazan's expulsados, a fine, military-looking man, but, as he told us, not a soldier by profession; he was in office by accident, and exceedingly anxious to lay down his command; indeed, his brief service had been no sinecure. He introduced us to Don Juan Lavanigno, an Italian from Genoa, banished on account of a revolution. How the signor found his way to this place I did not learn, but he had not found peace; and, if I am not deceived, he was as anxious to get out of it as ever he was to leave Genoa.

On our return to the convent we found the cura, who gave us personally the welcome assured to us by his housekeeper. With him was a respectable-looking Indian, bearing the imposing title of Gobernador, being the Indian alcalde; and it was rather singular that, in an hour after our arrival at Quezaltenango, we had become acquainted with the four surviving victims of Carrera's wrath, all of whom had narrowly escaped death at the time of the outrage, the rumour of which reached us at Guatimala. The place was still quivering under the shock of that event. We had heard many of the particulars on the road, and in Quezaltenango, except the parties concerned, no one could speak of anything else.

On the first entry of Morazan's soldiers into the plaza at Guatimala, in an unfortunate moment, a courier was sent to Quezaltenango to announce the capture of the city. The effect there was immediate and decided; the people rose upon the garrison left by Carrera, and required them to lay down their arms. The corregidor, not wishing to fire upon the townsmen, and finding it would be impossible with his small force to repress the insurrection, by the advice of the cura and Don Juan Lavanigno, to prevent bloodshed and a general massacre, induced the soldiers to lay down their arms and leave the town. The same night the municipality, without his knowledge, nominated Don Juan Lavanigno as commandant. He refused to serve; but the town was in a