282 ON THE FEONTIEE. 



have entered, and how beautifully are those mountains 

 clothed with tropic vegetation. 



Acapulco's bay for the harbour really is a bay is in its 

 way unique. It is supposed by geologists to be the crater of 

 an extinct volcano that has suffered subsidence, is quite 

 oval, its shores go down almost perpendicularly, and it con- 

 tains the bluest, clearest sea-water that ever lay in bay. 

 Often into it have I thrown small silver coins for the little 

 native children to dive after, and watched the reals glisten- 

 ing down for many a fathom, followed fast by the dusky 

 divers. 



Looking east, you see at the edge of the water a cres- 

 cent sweep of white shell-sand, and just beyond it the 

 town such a picturesque one. The majority of the build- 

 ings are low, having only ground-floors ; their white- 

 washed walls are upright rows of bamboo-canes ; their 

 tall steep roofs of reed-cane thatch, two feet thick, with 

 wide overhanging eaves. There they stand, dotted about 

 in all directions with the most charming irregularity, sur- 

 rounded and overhung with tree-ferns, shady orange-trees, 

 towering palms, and bread-fruits. To your right is the 

 crumbling old Spanish fort, many a time assailed in the 

 olden days by bold buccaneers. Kidd and Drake have 

 both the credit of its capture. The banners of the old 

 Spanish viceroys have waved over it, the Union Jack, and 

 the Tricolour ; but patriotism and the climate have always 

 put the flag of the country back again. Long may it wave 

 there ! On your left, standing in groups almost to the 

 water's edge, appears a magnificent grove of palms the 

 city of the dead. The underbrush that once grew beneath 



