182 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



vourite subject. He was in favour of Morazan, or Car- 

 rera, or el Demonio : 11 vamos adelante," " go ahead,' 1 

 was his motto ; he laughed at them all. If we had parted 

 with him then, we should always have remembered him 

 as the laughing cura ; but, on farther acquaintance, we 

 found in him such a vein of strong sense and knowl- 

 edge, and, retired as he lived, he was so intimately ac- 

 quainted with the country and all the public men, as a 

 mere looker on his views were so correct and his satire 

 so keen, yet without malice, that we improved his title 

 by calling him the laughing philosopher. 



Having finished our observations at this place, stop- 

 ping to laugh as some new greatness or folly of the 

 world, past, present, or to come, occurred to us, we 

 descended by a narrow path, crossed a ravine, and 

 entered upon the table of land on which stood the 

 palace and principal part of the city. Mr. Cather- 

 wood and I began examining and measuring the ruins, 

 and the padre followed us, talking and laughing all the 

 time ; and when we were on some high place, out of 

 his reach, he seated Bobon at the foot, discoursing to 

 him of Alvarado, and Montezuma, and the daughter of 

 the King of Tecpan Guatimala, and books and manu- 

 scripts in the convent ; to all which Bobon listened with- 

 out comprehending a word or moving a muscle, looking 

 him directly in the face, and answering his long low 

 laugh with a respectful " Si, senor." 



The plan in the division of the last engraving marked 

 A, represents the topography of the ground in the heart 

 of the city which was occupied by the palace and other 

 buildings of the royal house of Quiche. It is surround- 

 ed by an immense barranca or ravine, and the only en- 

 trance is through that part of the ravine by which we 

 reached it, and which is defended by the fortress before 



