123 Information respecting Scientific Travellers. 



the better times which have disappeared, we must be bankrupts. I 

 give some examples of this dearness of all things, which has not di- 

 minished in spite of the universal distress which weighs upon the 

 country : wretched mules covered with sores, fifty good piastres 

 each ; the keep of the eight which we have bought, costs us here at 

 Vera-Cruz, six piastres a day; we pay sixteen piastres a month to 

 the mozo who leads them ; an old second-hand Mexican saddle, 

 twenty piastres ; a pair of armas de aqua, calf-skins attached to the 

 saddle to protect the legs of the rider against rain, and in the woods 

 against thorns, twelve piastres; and the colchores and coquinillos, 

 kinds of wallet, eight piastres ; a hammock, six piastres ; a musque- 

 teer, eight; the carriage of a mule's load from hence to Mexico, 

 thirty piastres, &c. &c. Judge from these of the expense to which 

 a traveller must be subjected, whether for his own outlay or in order 

 to forward his collections. For this reason we preferred procuring a 

 sufficient number of beasts of burthen at first, so as not to be obliged 

 to hire fresh mules and conductors in the interior, which would cost 

 us even much more. On account of the insecure state of the coun- 

 try, and of the almost absolute impossibility of joining a long cara- 

 van in the steep mountain-passes, it was necessary also to make up 

 my mind to separate myself from the greater part of my baggage 

 and my books, and to leave them at Vera-Cruz ; I only keep by me 

 the most indispensable instruments of observation. 



** In two days we set off. We shall pass by Antigua, Papantla, 

 Misantla and Tuzpan ; then, crossing the high table lands of the in- 

 terior, we shall reach the zone of the Echinocacti and of the Melo^ 

 cacti ; thence we shall pass the foot of the volcanoes of Perote and 

 Orizaba on the west." 



" Xicaltepec, April 9, 1841. 



** We have reached this village in good health after a journey of 

 sixty leagues from Vera-Cruz. The whole of the country we have 

 just passed through is a part of what is called Tierra caliente, burn- 

 ing earth : the greater part of our route was across the scorching 

 sands on the sea- coast, and the remainder at a distance of eight or 

 ten leagues from the coast, amongst the low mountains which run 

 parallel to the high mountains of the interior and decline towards the 

 sea, thus forming a series of terraces. The vegetation with which I 

 have become acquainted in this region certainly equals in richness 

 that of the most interesting parts of Peru, and at the same time it is 

 very little known, because the yellow fever which often prevails in 

 this zone, and the insupportable scourge of myriads of all kinds of in- 

 sects which allow of no rest by night or day, have hitherto kept most 

 naturalists away. I have not yet suffered from the heat of the cli- 

 mate, but my companion took a fever at Colipa, from which, however, 

 he recovered in a week. Colipa, the first Indian village we met with, is 

 ten leagues from the coast, amidst mountains covered with the most 

 magnificent virgin forests of so varied a vegetation, that in a week's 

 time M. Karwinsky made a collection of 100 kinds of hard woods. 

 We remained twenty- seven days in this place, both on account of 

 our rich harvests and because it was impossible to find a dwelling at 



