10 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



tigue. Before we were half way up they disencumber- 

 ed themselves of the water-jar and provisions, and yet 

 they lagged behind. The alcalde was a man about 

 forty, who rode his own horse, and being a man of con- 

 sequence in the town, I could not order him to go fast- 

 er ; his associate was some ten years older, and physi- 

 cally incapable ; and seeing that they did not know any 

 particular path, I left them and went on alone. 



At eleven o'clock, or three hours from the village of 

 Nindiri, I reached the high point at which we were 

 aiming ; and from this point I expected to look down 

 into the crater of the volcano ; but there was no crater, 

 and the whole surface was covered with gigantic mass- 

 es of lava, and overgrown with bushes and scrub trees. 

 I waited till my guides came up, who told me that this 

 was the Volcano of Masaya, and that there was nothing 

 more to see. The alcalde insisted that two years before 

 he had ascended with the cura, since deceased, and a 

 party of villagers, and they all stopped at this place. I 

 was disappointed and dissatisfied. Directly opposite 

 rose a high peak, which I thought, from its position, 

 must command a view of the crater of the other volca- 

 no. I attempted to reach it by passing round the cir- 

 cumference of the mountain, but was obstructed by an 

 immense chasm, and returning, struck directly across. 

 I had no idea what I was attempting. The whole was 

 covered with lava lying in ridges and irregular masses, 

 the surface varying at every step, and overgrown with 

 trees and bushes. After an hour of the hardest work I 

 ever had in my life, I reached the point at which I aim- 

 ed, and, to my astonishment, instead of seeing the cra- 

 ter of the distant volcano, I was on the brink of another. 



Among the recorded wonders of the discoveries in 

 America, this mountain was one ; and the Spaniards, 



