Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/154

134 of its political government, and the disposition of the people, its resources, financial, military, commercial, and territorial, the amount of its population, the number and wealth of its towns, its principal means of communication with itself and with the exterior;"—and "that I should draw up a report upon those heads and upon any other points, on which I might be able to obtain information, respecting Guatemala, of interest to his Majesty's Government."—I revolved in my mind the importance of these subjects, at the breakfast which I took with the hospitable family, whose house I had entered, and of whom I shall have occasion to speak more hereafter. I had made inquiries about a house; but, finding that I could not obtain a respectable one, without taking it for a fixed period, and, even then, paying 6,000 dollars as a traspaso, (a good will repayable by the next tenant,) in advance, I renounced the idea, and became domiciliated with the family in question. The consul from the