TURRUCARES AND RIO GRANDE DE TARCOLES 361 



mortar, in two parallel rows, separated by an interval 

 greater than the width of either row. This space was 

 closed at one end, but open at the other and also at the 

 middle of one row of bricks. The cooking utensils were 

 placed on the two rows of bricks; when in position, addi- 

 tional wood could be introduced through either of the open- 

 ings. Water was boiled in an iron kettle of familiar shape. 



I saw most of the stages of the making and baking of tor- 

 tillas while staying here, excepting only the very first when 

 corn (maize) is boiled with wood ashes to loosen the hulls of 

 the grains. Modesta, the Custodio's eldest daughter, took 

 the boiled mass in a basket to a little swift-flowing stream 

 behind the house, where she washed it with her hands to 

 remove the hulls. The pasty, starchy mass remaining was 

 taken back to the kitchen and ground in an iron coffee mill. 

 Formerly, throughout Central America, this grinding was 

 done with the "piedra" and "mano de piedra," but the iron 

 mill is fast superseding these stone implements. Professor 

 Tristan told me that he had seen the disappearance of the 

 latter between two visits to Santa Maria Dota, one of the 

 most southern villages of the Pacific side of central Costa 

 Rica. After grinding, Modesta put a small lump of the 

 ground corn — of about the quantity proper for a single tor- 

 tilla — on a flat stone, rubbed it a little with a smaller stone, 

 to make it still finer, I believe, placed this upon a bit of 

 plantain or banana leaf and flattened it with the palm of her 

 hand into a thin round cake six or seven inches in diameter. 

 It was then laid on a hot concave iron plate already in posi- 

 tion on the rows of bricks, across the fire, where it was 

 cooked and then stood up on edge against the outer side of 

 the middle opening of one row. No doubt some of these de- 

 tails were individual peculiarities of Modesta's. 



Our diet was of the usual Costa Rican style, but the in- 

 gredients were different from those I have mentioned for 



