38 A NATURALIST IN MEXICO. 



Like all Mexican Jowns, it was laid out with its plaza 

 and streets running at right angles, and was distinguished 

 among the towns of Yucatan for its stone houses. These 

 were on the plaza and streets adjoining; outside these, and 

 extending more than a mile each way, were the huts of the 

 natives. These huts were generally plastered, enclosed by 

 stone fences, and overgrown and concealed by weeds. The 

 population was said to be about ten thousand, of which 

 about a thousand were white people, and the rest natives. 



The church and convent occupied the whole of one side 

 of the plaza. Both were built by the Franciscan monks, 

 and they were among the grandest of those buildings with 

 which that wonderful order marked its entrance into the 

 country. They stood on a stone platform about four feet 

 high and several hundred feet in front. The church was 

 large and sombre, and adorned with rude monuments and 

 figures calculated to inspire the ignorant natives with awe. 

 The convent was connected with the church by a spacious 

 corridor, now much in ruins. It was a large structure built 

 of stone, with massive walls, and four hundred feet in length. 

 The entrance was under a wide portico, with stone pillars, 

 from which ascended a broad flight of steps to a spacious 

 corridor twenty feet wide. This corridor ran through the 

 whole length of the building, with a stone pavement, and 

 was lighted from the roof which had fallen in. Everything 

 about the old convent bespoke ruin and decay. 



