152 



MEXICO, CENTRAL AMERICA, WEST INDIES. 



cenotes. Through the increasing gloom they follow the inclines excavatvjd obliquely 

 in the rocky wall until they reach the vaults from which hang stalactites entwined 

 by long pendent algae. Here they fill their large pitchers with the dark fluid, 

 w^hich his to be brought laboriously to the surfa(;e. The work entailed on the 

 women is perhaps heaviest at the cenote of Bolonchen, or the " Nine Springs," a 

 ruined village lying north-east of Campeachy on the road to Merida. Here the 

 deep cavity is reached through fissures in the rock and spiral stairs forming a 

 gallery altogether nearly 550 yards long and descending to an absolute depth of 

 about 410 feet below the surface of the ground. 



The form of the coast-line along the northern seaboard oi the peninsula may 



Fig-. 66. — Tkr Rio of Yucat^.x. 

 Scile 1 : 4,000.000. 



Depths. 



to 50 

 Fathoms. 



50 Fathoms 

 and upwards. 



60 Miles. 



be partly explained by the pressure of the inland waters spreading out beneath 

 the surface of the limestone plateau. A strip of laud fringes the shore at the 

 north-east corner of Yucatan, but it has not the free development of the littoral 

 cordons skirting the Texas and Tamaulipas coasts on the opposite side of the 

 Gulf. It is disposed in a narrow band near the true shore-line, the outer and 

 inner beaches presenting the same curves with a surprising parallelism. It 

 becomes somewhat less regular towards the eastern extremity, whirre it is inter- 

 rupted at several points, and even forms the large island of Holbox facing the 

 Boca del Conil ("Rabbit's Mouth"), a considerable inlet, where extremely copious 

 springs bubble up amid the marine waters about a quarter of a mile from the 

 coast. The normal cordon, beginning west of this inlet, runs for a distance of 



