370 INTENDANCY OF 
Bay of Campeachy and that of Honduras. It is 
bounded on the south by Guatimala, on the east by 
the province of Vera Cruz, and on the west by the 
English establishments which extend from the mouth 
of the Rio Hondo to the north of the Bay of Hanover. 
This peninsula is a vast plain, intersected by a chain 
of hills ; and though one of the warmest, it is at the 
same time one of the healthiest provinces of equinoc- 
tial America. The latter circumstance is to be at- 
tributed to the extreme dryness of the soil and at- 
mosphere. No European grain is produced; but 
maize, jatropha, and dioscorea are cultivated in 
abundance. The Hoematoxylon or Campeachy 
wood abounds in several districts. Merida, the 
capital, has a population of 10,000. 
9. The government of Vera Cruz extends along 
the Mexican Gulf from the Rio Baraderas to the 
great river of Panuco. The western part forms the 
declivity of the cordilleras of Anahuac, from whence, 
amid the regions of perpetual snow, the inhabitants 
descend in a day to the burning plains of the coast. 
In this district are displayed in a remarkable man- 
ner the gradations of vegetation, from the level of the 
sea to those elevated summits which are visited with 
perennial frost. In ascending, the traveller sees the 
physiognomy of the country, the aspect of the sky, 
the form of the plants, the figures of animals, the man- 
ners of the inhabitants and the kind of cultivation 
followed by them, assuming a different appearance 
at every step. Leaving the lower districts, covered 
with a beautiful and luxuriant vegetation, he first 
enters that in which the oak appears, where he has no 
longer cause to dread the yellow fever, so fatal on the 
coasts. Forests of liquidambar, near Xalapa, an- 
