Page:Mexico as it was and as it is.djvu/262

Rh and themselves were all at our command, and with a cordiality that forbad the idea of an arrière pensée.

Living in the country, at a distance from large towns, with but little literature and few and irregularly received newspapers, the hacendados and their administradors are glad to welcome the traveller as a guest to their doors. With ample means of accommodation and entertainment, they enjoy as well as confer a favor, and are as thankful for your visit, as you are to them for their repasts and attentions. You feel that the account is fairly balanced, and that the other little elegancies and assiduities which are thrown in for your comfort are the result of genuine hospitality, and the promptings of excellent hearts. They are noble, liberal, generous gentlefolks; and I hope again to travel in the tierra caliente, and meet a few Señor Sylvas, Don Antonios, and Don Felipes.

27th September. We left Ayotla at half-past two this morning, and arrived at the city gates just after sunrise, as the cannons were firing in honor of the day which is to be celebrated by the entombment of the remains of Santa Anna's leg that was shot off at the battle of Vera Cruz in 1838!

The principal streets were covered with an awning; the military came out in all their finery; the chief functionaries of the Government united in the procession; and thus, the limb of the President—cut off in 1838—buried since then at Vera Cruz—disinterred and brought to the Capital in 1842—and now, laid in a crystal vase—was borne to the cemetery of Santa Paula, where it was deposited in a monument erected to receive it by the Commissary general of the Mexican army!

A solemn eulogium (on the President—not the leg) was then pronounced by Señor Sierra y Rosa, and the ceremonies in honor of the precious relic were, concluded.

A caustic "Protest of the dead bodies of the cemetery against the reception of the limb among them,"—was soon afterward found on an adjacent tomb.