Page:Our Sister Republic - Mexico.djvu/515

Rh lying useless on the roof. Inside there are court-yards, plazas or parade-grounds of sufficient extent for a large force, and quarters for a thousand men or more.

The Spaniards, in constructing this fortress, made all provision for defending it to the last extremity against assault. The moat passed and the outer wall scaled, the assailants would find the garrison retreating into several minor castles, each with its own moat and draw-bridge, and, in those days, "a hard nut to crack," in every sense of the expression. The moat is now so filled with sand and debris as to be fordable even at high-tide, and the old draw-bridges being no longer of any use, have been replaced by bridges which are fixed in their places and answer better the purposes of communication between the different sections of the castle. I should say at a rough guess, that the whole fortification covers eight to ten acres.

Outside the old main wall, on the eastern front and northern end, there is now an earth-work of sufficient height to screen the gunners, and mounted with about twenty pretty heavy guns. This battery if put in order, might be capable of doing some serious damage to a hostile fleet; but the value set upon it by the French may be inferred from the fact that they dumped an enormous pile of coal—some thousands of tons—right into it, covering several of the guns on the north end to a depth of many feet, and the coal lies there yet, just as they left it in the haste of their departure. I suppose that I break no law of hospitality in saying what everybody who has visited the castle within the last ten years knows, that, practically, this old fortress, once one of the strongest and most formidable in the world, is to day utterly worthless for defence against a