178 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



of the proprietor, Don Juan's brother and our land- 

 lord. 



The next morning a short time enabled us to see 

 all the objects of interest in the new village of 

 Iturbide. Five years before the plough had run 

 over the ground nov^ occupied by the plaza, or, 

 more literally, as the plough is not known in Yuca- 

 tan, the plaza is on the ground formerly occupied by 

 an old milperia, or cornfield. In those ancient days 

 it was probably enclosed by a bush fence ; now, at 

 one corner rises a thatched house, with an arbour 

 before it, and a table under the arbour, at which, per- 

 haps, at this moment the principal inhabitants are 

 playing monte. Opposite, on the other corner, 

 stood, and still stands if it has not fallen down, a 

 casa de paja (thatched house) from which the 

 thatching had been blown away, and in which 

 were the undisposed-of remains of an ox for sale. 

 Along the sides were whitewashed huts, and on one 

 corner a large, neat house, belonging to our friend 

 Sefior Trego ; then a small edifice with a cross in 

 the roof, marking it as a church ; and, finally, an 

 open casa publica, very aptly so called, as it had no 

 doors. Such are the edifices which in five years 

 have sprung up in the new village of Iturbide ; and 

 attached to each house was a muddy yard, where 

 large black pigs were wallowing in the mire, the 

 special objects of their owner's care, soon to become 

 large black hogs, and to bring ten or twelve dollars 

 a piece in the Campeachy market. But, interesting 



