SIX MONTHS IN MEXICO. 



and monasteries. The nuns are celebrated for 

 making artificial flowers, which are composed 

 entirely of feathers; our young gentlemen 

 purchased largely of them, and had much 

 amusement in tjieir bargains with the holy 

 sisters, who received their coarse jokes on the 

 state of perpetual celibacy with great good 

 humour. Much as I longed for home, I could 

 have spent some time at this place with plea- 

 sure. On leaving St. Michael's, we passed 

 over the Island of Sabrina, which only a few 

 years since rose suddenly out of the sea, to a 

 considerable height, and in a short time again 

 disappeared ; it has now forty fathom water 

 upon it. An English gentleman, who was 

 at St. MichaelV at the time, told me that he 

 went near it in a boat when it was rising, and 

 that the heat of the water was so intense, that a 

 great number of fishes obviously killed by it 

 were seen floating in all directions. We ar- 

 rived at Spithead, and landed at Portsmouth 



