Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/134

114 these insects, which seem to line all the paths by myriads, resembles the hissing of boiling water. When the rays of the sun have parched up the plain, and the heat is glimmering in the atmosphere, these little insects seem, unnecessarily, to be reminding you that it is "hissing hot." My companion told me that Æsop had written a fable about them, called the Horniga and Cigarra; that they died singing, and that they were vulgarly called chicharra.

We now entered some lanes, with gates, here and there, so disposed as to impound or keep out cattle, and giving one the idea of those leading into an English village. That at which we arrived contained about 1,000 souls. As every Spanish town and settlement is formed on the same model, which varies only as to elegance and size, this village had, of course, its grand Plaza, in the middle of which was a tree, and which, for it was, certainly, one of the largest I had seen in these parts, completely shadowed with its branches the whole area of