A CURIOUS BASIN. 



127 



The padre took a lively interest in the zeal late- 

 ly awakened for exploring the antiquities of the 

 country, and told us that this particular region 

 abounded with traces of the ancient inhabitants. At 

 a short distance from the camino real we came to a 

 line of fallen stones, forming what appeared to be 

 the remains of a wall which crossed the road, and 

 ran off into the forest on both sides, traversing, he 

 said, the country for a great distance in both direc- 

 tions. 



A short distance beyond, we turned off to a large 

 hollow basin perfectly dry, which he called an agua- 

 da, and said it was an artificial formation, excavated 

 and walled around, and had been used by the ancients 

 as a reservoir for water. At the time, we did not 

 agree with him, but considered the basin a natural 

 formation, though, from what we saw afterward, we 

 are induced to believe that his account may have 

 been correct. 



At ten o'clock we reached the small village of 

 Telchaquillo, containing a population of six hundred 

 souls, and these, again, were all Indians. It was 

 they who had made the road we had travelled over, 

 and the church was under our friend's pastoral 

 charge. We rode to the convent, and dismounted. 

 Immediately the bell of the church tolled, to give no- 

 tice of his arrival, that all who wished to confess or 

 get married, who had sick to be visited, children to 

 be baptized, or dead to be buried, might apply to 

 him, and have their wants attended to. 



