OF SAJVfTO DOMINGO. 



79 



Abajo, are simply a house each, used periodically by the pig-hunters. I have seen 

 flourishing farms in Oi'egon infinitely worse off in location, soil and accessibility than 

 the average of this region. In 1869, I spent a week among these mountains in com- 

 pany with Mr. A. Pennell and a party of natives. There was nobody sufficiently 

 acquainted with them to serve as guide, and we were obliged to pick our way across 

 as best we could. Between Maniel and the I^Tigua there is not a single inhabitant 

 and hardly a trail. Pig-hunters' trails penetrate from one side and the other, but 

 none cross the tract. The Valley of Maniel is a beautiful little spot of but a few 

 thousand acres, shut in by mountains on all sides, except where the canon of the 

 Ocoa River gives a pretence of a level road. The road from Honduras to Maniel cross- 

 es the river only thirty-five times ! Of course this means that during the rains this 

 route is impassable, and the inhabitants of the valley must cross the mountains 

 towards Azua, if they wish to communicate with the outside world. 



West of the Ocoa River the mountains are quite heavy, and send a spur south- 

 ward which reaches entirely to the beach. This spur is low and is crossed by two 

 passes, one from Maniel, the other called the Pass of the I^umero, a road running 

 around the north side of Las Tablas hills. Still a third route skirts around the end 

 of the range, following the coast, often on the beach. This, though longer, is often 

 used in preference to the l^Tumero on account of its being much smoother. The 

 vicinity of Azua, that is to say, the tract lying east of the town, could hardly be 

 more desolate. It is a nearly fiat, perfectly dry tract, overgrown with thorny acacias 

 and cactus, while thickets of the Maya or hedge pine-apple, render it yet more im- 

 passable and unattractive. The whole neighborhood of the town is alike barren, dry 

 and thorny. But three or four miles to the southwest, at los Conucos, the character 

 of the country changes suddenly and entirel3^ This is a level, sandy region, where 

 from geological causes, the subsoil at a depth of but six or eight feet is permanently 

 saturated with water. Here is the richest sugar-cane region on the Island, although 

 it is at same time one of the most unhealthy. In ordinary years, rain is almost un- 

 known here ; but when, as occurs sometimes, it does rain, the whole region becomes 

 little better than a swamp. 



Back of Azua, that is to say, up to the hills, the same acacia and cactus thicket 

 continues, broken only where a miserable little stream fui-nishing a narrow strip of 

 moisture, produces a corresponding change in the trees. On the Agua hedeondo, or 

 stinking water, there is a grove of Mango trees, and more remarkable still, the only 

 date-palm I have seen on the Island. Its rough stem and almost solid ball of foliage 

 looked like an old friend, the more welcome because I came upon it unexpectedly in 

 the woods. Although so old as to be almost past bearing, its vigorous, healthy ap- 



