Page:Researches in the Central Portion of the Usumatsintla Valley.djvu/48

40 of the cayuco. Allowing ourselves but little time for rest, in spite of the soaked condition of the trails, we arrived late in the afternoon at Tinieblas, where the people regarded us with great respect and thought it wonderful that we, coming from a distance in the middle of the rainy season, had found the lake which they had never even seen.

The Indians made various purchases in the montería, and the very next day returned to their wilderness. We rested a day, and then set out on our return to La Reforma, where, when at last we arrived, we were, as always, most courteously received by Mr. Molina and the other gentlemen.

Here I dismissed my men from Tenosique, who had shown discontent during the whole expedition, and accepted Mr. Molina's kind invitation to go down the Chacamáx in one of the cayucos of the firm of Romano, as far as the Usumatsintla and to Montecristo, lying just below the confluence of the two rivers. Thence the return by steamer to my little house at our station in Tenosique offered no further difficulties.

  VI.

PIEDRAS NEGRAS. After I had traversed the entire peninsula of Yucatan in 1895 and had rested in Flores — the ancient Peten-Itza — I took the route to the upper Usumatsintla by way of Sacluc, in order to return to Mérida by water via Tenosique and Cármen. Accordingly I came down from El Paso Real in a cayuco as far as the ruins of Yāxchilan, but from that point, owing to dangerous rapids, I was obliged once more to make use of forest trails in order to reach Tenosique, whence the journey to the sea was easily accomplished.

On the way, while spending the night at the montería El Cayo (on the left shore of the Usumatsintla) I made inquiries of the Encargado, Don Tránsito Mejenes, and of his people as to whether ruins of any kind whatever had been met with in the forests of this region, and I was successful in gaining information regarding the sites of several ruined cities, of which Piedras Negras proved to be the most important.

The distance from El Cayo to Tenosique is reckoned at twenty Mexican leagues. The first five bring one to the site of the ruins, where, until recently, there had been a montería under the management of Sr. D. Emiliano Palma, who by this time, however, had gone deeper into the forest with his men.