Page:Travels in Mexico and life among the Mexicans.djvu/156

148 and pound the horse with the branch of a tree from behind, while the old Indian dragged him ahead from in front. There were two long leagues of this kind of travelling, and we were much rejoiced when some straggling huts announced the approach to the seaport of Ɔilam. A large portion of the way was through a mangrove forest, where I had good opportunities for studying this peculiar tree, noticing how it sent out and down its aerial roots for a foothold in the water and at the border of the sea, and the entire absence of such adventitious shoots back a little distance on firm land.

At the Puerta—a collection of thatched houses and a half completed church—we sought for breakfast, and, seeing a fine-looking girl in a doorway, with a tray of fruit on her head, I asked if we could get it there. She said yes, and gave me some tortillas and frijoles; but the table was destitute of plate, knife, or spoon, though it was clean. After breakfast I reclined in a hammock in an inner room, while the young girl swung in another a few feet distant, with a plump babe of a year or so in her lap. She was hardly fourteen, large and finely formed, with lovely oval face, and large dark eyes. She looked so young and childlike, despite her maturity and maternity, that I could hardly believe her the mother of such a bouncing child, and asked if it were really hers. "Si, señor," she answered, slowly raising the lashes from her beautiful eyes, "es mio,"—" it is mine,"—and she added, with a charming frankness that astonished me, "And yours too if you will accept it." I had intended saying something neat in compliment before I got this answer, but such an excess of politeness as an offer of a joint interest in a child I had never seen before that hour fairly overwhelmed me, and I silently withdrew, settled my bill, mounted, and rode away.

The two leagues between the port and Ɔilam proper were soon gone over, and I slept that night in the casa of Don Juan el viejo,—of Mr. John the old man. "Manana temprano" was the order I gave my Indian for the morrow, and for a wonder he appeared at daylight. It rained at intervals as we rode towards Timax, but the air was pure, and sweet with the odors