HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



19 



each other, have emitted fire at different periods, in 

 our time (o). 



Befides thefe mountains there are I ike wife others, 

 which, though not burning mountains, are yet of great 

 celebrity for their height ; namely, Matlakueye, or the 

 mountain of Tlafcala ; Nappateii6lli^ called by the Span- 

 iards, from its figure, Cofre or trunk ; lentzon^ near 

 to the village of Moacaxac, Toloccan, and others, 

 which, being of no importance to the fubje£l:, I inten- 

 tionally omit. Every one knows that the famous chain 

 of the Andes, or Alps of South America, arc continued 

 through the ifthmus of Panama, and through all Nev/ 

 Spain till they lofe themfelves in the unknown countries 

 of the North. The mod confiderable part of this chain 

 is known in that kingdom under the name of Sierra 

 Madre^ particularly in Cinaloa, and Tarahumara, pro- 

 vinces twelve hundred miles diftant from the capital. 



The 



(o) A few years ngo an account was publlflied in Italy, concerning the moun- 

 tains of Tocbtlan or Tuftla, full of curious, but too ridiculous lies ; in which 

 there was a defcription of rivers of fire, of frightful elephants, &c. We do 

 not mention among the burning mountains, neither Juruyo^ nor Mamotombo^ of 

 Nicaragua ; nor that of Guatemala ; becaufe neither of thefe three was com- 

 prehended under the Mexican dominions. That of Guatemala, laid in ruins 

 with earthquakes, that great and beautiful city, the 29th of July, 1773. 

 With refped; to Juruyo, fituated in the valley of Urecho, in the kingdom of 

 Michuacan, before the year 1760, there was nothing of it but a fmall hill 

 where there was a fugar plantation. But on the 29th of September, 1760, it 

 burft with furious fliocks, and entirely ruined the fugar work, and the neigh- 

 bouring village of Guacana ; and from that time has continued to emit fire and 

 burning rocks, which have formed themfelves into three high mountains, whofe 

 circumference was nearly fix miles, in 1766, according to the account com- 

 municated to me, by Don Emmanuelle di Buftamante, governor of that pro- 

 vince, and an eye-witnefs of the fasSl. The afties at the eruption, were forced 

 as far as the city of Queretaro, one hundred and fifty miles difl;ant from Ju- 

 ruyo, a matter almoft incredible, but public and notorious in that city ; where 

 a gentleman flvewed me, in a paper, the afhes which he had gathered. In 

 the city of Valadolid, fixty miles diftant, it rained afties in fuch abundance, 

 they were obliged to fweep the yards of the houfes two or three times dur- 

 ing the day. 



