WHOLE VOL. THE WEST INDIES VAZQUEZ DE ESTINOSA 227 



in red earthenware, made of a very fine clay which they get from 

 a watercourse rtmning at the foot of the sierra. 



646. The town of Sonsonate has many cattle ranches in its district. 

 All this country is full of groves and woods and seems a bit of 

 Paradise. In the woods there are many fruit trees and especially 

 red sapotes, guavas, oranges, lemons, siuties, white sapotes, custard- 

 apples, bananas, cojiniclules, aguacates, and others, to enumerate 

 which would lead to infinity ; leguminous trees bearing small beans, 

 resembling oak trees, but with bigger leaves ; the beans come in large 

 round pods ; when they are ripe the sun's heat makes them explode 

 with a loud noise like the report of a gun ; each pod contains 12 or 14 

 beans. There are other small trees producing another excellent laxa- 

 tive; they call them pinones (pine nuts). The matalista is another 

 laxative, and good antidote as well. They raise annatto also. Five 

 leagues from the town on the San Salvador road there are many 

 balsam trees, which will be described in their proper place. Guate- 

 mala lies 36 leagues approximately W. of Sonsonate, and the city 

 of San Salvador, 12 leagues to its ENE. 



647. In the district of this town there is a volcano which has 

 thrown out much fire and ashes. It is in a mountain range, all along 

 whose slopes lie many Indian villages. This range is covered with 

 woods and groves ; it is very fertile, and in the clearings they have 

 made, wheat and corn yield very large crops. The oaks growing on 

 this sierra bear acorns as large as inkwells and they make inkwells 

 out of them. They have fine tall cedars, ebony, red ebony, and other 

 aromatic and valuable timber. 



648. There are many kinds of animals here : small bears with no 

 mouth but at the tip of their snout an opening through which they 

 put out their tongue and suck up the honey they find in hollow trees, 

 and when that fails them they go to the anthills and when their tongue 

 is covered with ants, they draw it in, and that is how they live. They 

 have wolves they call coyotes, quite like Spanish ones but not so 

 savage ; tapirs, stags, tigers, lions, and other animals, and many 

 varieties of unusual birds. 



649. In the woods on this sierra rise many streams of hot water 

 with various constituents. The Indian women of Ahuachapan put 

 the clay in this water for the operations of their pottery ; a cochineal- 

 red creamy substance is deposited on the clay, and they use it to give 

 a delicate color to their pottery ; it is a kind of Armenian bole, being 

 valuable for bloody flux and for other troubles. 



