Page:Travels in Mexico and life among the Mexicans.djvu/387

 below a certain altitude—the fields improved; wheat and barley grew high and thick, as far as the eye could reach. Over to the left was a flour-mill all alone. There are no houses between the town and the crater,—"Only," says Don Felipe, solemnly, and crossing himself hastily,—"only the mountains and God!"

The pines grew more abundant, and the air was filled with their resinous odor; jays and chickadees—birds of the temperate zone—flitted from tree to tree, and reminded me of Northern woods. A high, conical hill, rising out of a great field to the right, planted with corn to the top, and with rude ruins on its summit, is called Tetepetongo, the hill of the round stones, and was formerly used as an Indian place of sacrifice,—at least so says tradition. A sister elevation a mile distant, also artificial, or artificially graded, is known as Tusantepec, As we went up among immense trees, old Popo' seemed at one time right ahead, shining golden in the setting sun; again, he was far away, and we seemed travelling from him. We went up, still up, the great trees growing greater, towering far above us, huge hemlocks and pines. A hill covered with coarse grass was on our left, and, as we reached its base, the night crept upon us silently, and wrapped us in its sable folds. We were then ten thousand feet above the sea, enclosed in a cold atmosphere, and chilled by half-congealed rain. Nothing could compare, for dreariness, with the oppressive silence of those high forests; not even a murmur of wind in the tree-tops, no bird of night to startle us with his cries,—nothing but the hoof-beats of our horses, and the crackling of twigs and branches that they stepped upon.

Don Felipe, who had ridden before me silently, wrapped in his cloak, now halted, and demanded abruptly if I was armed.

I said certainly, and asked him if he also had a pistol.

"No," said he; "the people here all know me, and know that I am poor. But you—they think, of course, that you are rich."

"But there are no people living here."

"No; but they are passing all the time, and some may have followed us from town."