THE USE OF TOBACCO. 227 



were able to purchase some Indian corn for 

 our horses, but found the people the most 

 morose set of beings we had ever met with 

 in the country. They seemed to be all a bad 

 sort of half-caste Spaniard, without an Indian 

 among them. 



When we started the next morning, we 

 had scarce got three hundred yards on our 

 road, when our guide, whom I had remarked 

 seemed sadly out of temper, turned round 

 and began to spit towards the village, reviling 

 its inhabitants and the fathers and mothers 

 from whom they descended, in the choicest 

 " Chabacano." He would not tell me what 

 had got his back up so high, but he seemed 

 very irate, and said that, on his return, he 

 would rather sleep in the forest than in that 

 " Maldito lugar " 



A well-known author writes, that "tobacco 

 soothes the turbulence of the mind," so. giving 

 him a few choice cigars, he soon regained his 

 good humour, and began, when we were half 

 way to Granada, to descant on the beauties, 

 as he considered them, of his own country, for 

 he was a native of Granada domiciled in Leon. 



As we got nearer to his native place — 

 " See," said he, " Don Jorge, what a fine 

 road," pointing down to a good track about 



