RANCHO OF CHACK. 



11 



We were about entering a region little or not at 

 all frequented by white men, and occupied entirely 

 by Indians. Our road lay through the ruins of Ka- 

 bah, a league beyond which we reached the rancho 

 of Ghack. This was a large habitation of Indians, 

 under the jurisdiction of the village of Nohcacab. 

 There was not a white man in the place, and as we 

 rode through, the women snatched up their children, 

 and ran from us like startled deer. I rode up to a 

 hut into which I saw a woman enter, and, stopping 

 at the fence, merely from curiosity, took out a ci- 

 gar, and, making use of some of the few Maya words 

 we had picked up, asked for a light, but the door re- 

 mained shut. I dismounted, and before I had tied 

 my horse the women rushed out and disappeared 

 among the bushes. In one part of the rancho was 

 a casa real, being a long thatched hut with a large 

 square before it, protected by an arbour of leaves, and 

 on one side was a magnificent seybo tree, throwing 

 its shade to a great distance round. 



On leaving this rancho we saw at a distance on 

 the left a high ruined building standing alone amid 

 a great intervening growth of woods, and apparent- 

 ly inaccessible. Beyond, and at the distance of four 

 leagues from Nohcacab, we reached the rancho of 

 Schawill, which was our first stopping-place, on ac- 

 count of the ruius of Zayi in its immediate neigh- 

 bourhood. This place also was inhabited exclusive- 

 ly by Indians, rancho being the name given to a 

 settlement not of sufficient importance to constitute 



