216 The Naturalist in Nicaragua 
priest, therefore, is very watchful over these saints’ days, 
and sends warning beforehand to the Indians of the day 
of their saint. If they contribute not bountifully, then the 
priest will chide and threaten that he will not preach.” ? 
When we left Totagalpa, they were still drinking “ chicha;” 
and I shall not forget the solemn satisfied look of the shoeless 
corporation, as they sipped their drink in sight of their 
townspeople, now and then singling out some friend, to whom 
they signed to come and quaff at the big bowl. The warm 
drink had loosened the tongue of the solemn alcalde. He 
came, and with many compliments, wished us a good journey. 
He, good man, had reached the summit of his ambition—he 
was the chief of his native town; he wore shoes; and what 
more could he hope for or desire? 
The central government interferes but little with the 
local officials; and the small towns in the interior are almost 
self-governed. Neither do they pay any direct taxes, the 
only contributions to the national exchequer being fees for 
killing cattle, selling land or houses, and making agreements, 
and a government monopoly in the sale of tobacco and 
spirits. So the country folks lead an easy life, excepting in 
times of revolution, when they are pressed into the army. 
The Indian townships are better managed than those of the 
Spaniards and Mestizos; the plazas are kept freer from 
weeds, and the roads in good order. Probably nowhere but 
in tropical America can it be said that the introduction of 
European civilisation has caused a retrogression; and that 
those communities are the happiest and the best-governed 
who retain most of their old customs and habits. Yet there 
it is so. The civilisation that Cortez overthrew was more 
suitable for the Indians than that which has supplanted it. 
Who can read the accounts of the populous towns of Mexico 
and Central America in the time of Montezuma, with their 
magnificent buildings and squares; their gardens both 
zoological and botanical; their markets, attended by mer- 
chants from the surrounding countries; their beautiful cloth 
and feather work, the latter now a lost art; their picture 
writing; their cunning artificers in gold and silver; their 
astronomical knowledge; their schools; their love of order, 
of cleanliness, of decency; their morality and wonderful 
1 Toc. cit., pp. 332-334. 
