Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 2.djvu/283

Rh is about twelve leagues. The road through the Pĭnāl is extremely bad, and dangerous in unsettled times, the forest being the favourite haunt of banditti, who sometimes assemble there in considerable numbers for a coup de main; but our escort was too strong for us to feel any apprehensions of an attack.

We remained during the whole of the 22nd at La Puebla, as the Governor, whose hospitality and friendly disposition towards every Englishman of respectability who visits the town, I have ever found the same, would not hear of our passing a shorter time with him, than we had done at Jălāpă with General Bărrăgān. The delay afforded us an opportunity of seeing the Cathedral, a magnificent building, in the construction of which the Angels themselves are said to have taken a very active part. It is regarded by the Indians, and by a large proportion of the female Spanish population, as a well authenticated fact, that during the time that the walls of the edifice were constructing, two messengers from heaven descended every night, and added to their height exactly as much as had been raised, by the united efforts of the labourers, during the day. With such assistance the work advanced at a prodigious rate, and was brought to a conclusion in a much shorter space of time than could have been effected by human exertions alone. It is in grateful commemoration of this event that the name of the town, "La Puebla de los Angeles," was assumed; and