Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/83

CH. V.] as brown as berries and as merry as grigs. From their ears hung suspended large flat hoop ear-rings of pure gold: some of them wore a profusion of gold chains round their neck, and some of them strings of pearls, which, in their unwrought state, looked more like teeth than the teeth of the wearer (though not in most instances) looked like pearls. Don Miguel's wife had got possession, ex officio, of one of the hammocks, and the other was vacated for my acceptance, by a Guatemalian dandy. Although of the Mexican genus, he is a variety of the species: he wears the Mexican poncho or cloak, and sometimes the stamped leather leggings, but his dress is altogether plainer: it is seldom ornamented with gold or silver embroidery: his jacket is usually plain cotton, and when he wears woollen, it is more generally an English-cut frock-coat: his hat is also English, except when travelling, when it gives place to a large slouched one of straw or other light material, better calculated to keep off the sun's