CHAPTER YII. 



MEXICO. 



The letters with which Don Mariano de Urquizo had 

 furnished Humboldt before leaving Spain, introduced 

 him at Acapulco, and throughout Mexico, as they had 

 already done in South America, to the highest govern- 

 ment officials. We accordingly find him three days 

 after his arrival at the house of the contador, Don Bal- 

 •■asar Alvarez Ordono, taking observations to ascertain 

 ',he latitude and longitude of the town. Except in a sci- 

 entific point of view Acapulco had little to attract him. 

 It stood on the southern shore of Mexico, on the recess 

 of a bay, near a chain of granitic mountains. On a hill 

 commanding the town and the entrance to the harbour, 

 stood the castle or fortress of San Diego. The harbour 

 was shut in by mountains. It had two entrances formed 

 by the island of Roquetta; one a quarter of a mile 

 wide, the other a mile and a half. This was the extent 

 of its picturesqueness. 



From Acapulco, in the beginning of April, the travel- 

 lers proceeded to the capital, passing the plains of Chil- 

 pantzingo, rich in wheat fields, and the little town of 

 Tasco, famous for its beautiful church. They stopped at 

 Caernavaca on the southern declivity of the Cordillera 

 of Guchilaque, to rectify the longitude, which was incor- 



