Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/485

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Santiago de Guatemala, the capital, stands in the midst of a large handsome plain, surrounded on all sides by sierras of a moderate height, and at the distance of from three to seven leagues. These mountains which give to the whole view the valley of Mexico in miniature, are not so far off but that the eye may discover, through the rectilinear streets, in every direction, the verdure of the trees with which the surrounding heights are clad, and which, with the sloping meadow lands of different hues, affords a refreshing object, forming, as it were, a screen to the little city which lies in the midst, glaring with its white walls and domes and steeples of Yessa-cement in the rays of a tropical sun.

The houses are all built in quadras or squares of about 120 to 160 feet; and, sometimes, the front of one house occupies a whole quadra; but none of them exceed eighteen or twenty feet in height: of course