226 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



entangled among bushes. In a moment we scrambled 

 down to her, got her head turned up the bank, and by 

 means of strong halters heaved her out ; but she was 

 bruised and crippled, and barely able to stagger under 

 her load. Continuing along the ridge, swept by fierce 

 blasts of wind, we descended again to a river, rode some 

 distance along its bank, and passed a track up the side 

 of a mountain on the right, so steep that I had no idea 

 it could be our road, and passed it, but was called back. 

 It was the steepest ascent we had yet had in the coun- 

 try. It was cruel to push my brave macho, but I had 

 been tormented all day with a violent headache, and 

 could not walk ; so I beat up, making the best v tacks I 

 could, and stopping every time I put about. On the 

 top broke upon us one of those grand and magnificent 

 views which, when we had wiped off perspiration and 

 recovered breath, always indemnified us for Our toil. It 

 was the highest ground on which we had yet stood. 

 Around us was a sea of mountains, and peeping above 

 them, but so little as to give full effect to our own great 

 height, were the conical tops of two new volcanoes. 

 The surface was of limestone rock, in immense strata, 

 with quartz, in one piece of which we discovered a 

 speck of gold. Here again, in this vast wilderness of 

 mountains, deep in the bowels of the earth, are those 

 repositories of the precious ores for which millions upon 

 millions all over the world are toiling, bargaining, cra- 

 ving, and cheating every day. 



Continuing on this ridge, we came out upon a spur 

 commanding a view, far below us, of a cultivated val- 

 ley, and the village of San Sebastiano. We descend- 

 ed to the valley, left the village on our right, crossed 

 the spur, and saw the end of our day's journey, the town 

 of Gueguetenango, situated on an extensive plain, with 



