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318 northeast it bounds that of Mexico, and to the west, that of Guadalajara. It lies on the western slope of the Great Cordillera of Anahuac. Hills, woods, and beautiful valleys diversify its surface; its pasture grounds are watered by numerous streams, that rare advantage under the torrid zone, and the climate is cool and healthy. The Indians of this department are the Tarascos—the Ottomi and the Chichimeca Indians; the first are the most civilized of the tribes, and their language the most harmonious. We are now travelling in a northwesterly direction, towards the capital of the state, Valladolid, or Morelia, as it has been called since the independence, in honor of the curate Morelos, its great supporter.

We had a pleasant ride of nine leagues through an open pasture country, meeting with nothing very remarkable on our journey, but an Indian woman seated on the ground, her Indian husband standing beside her. Both had probably been refreshing themselves with pulque—perhaps even with its homeopathic extract mezcal; but the Indian was sober and sad, and stood with his arms folded, and the most patient and pitying face, while his wife, quite overcome with the strength of the potation, and unable to go any further, looked up at him with the most imploring air, saying repeatedly—"Matame, Miguel, matame," (kill me, Miguel—kill me)—apparently considering herself quite unfit to live.

About five o'clock, we came in sight of the pretty village and old church of Taximaroa; and riding up to the meson or inn, found two empty dark rooms with mud floors—without windows, in fact without