Chap. V.— B. S.J 
OCALCA. 
79 
people called on us, offering to sell us some. On the 
invitation of a Mr. Ramirez, ve visited a locality 
called Ocalca, several leagues from Matagalpa. In a 
plain through which a river of the same name, a tri¬ 
butary of the Matagalpa, winds its course, we found a 
gold mine, owned partly by Mr. Ramirez and partly 
by Messrs. Perez. One of the owners, Padre Perez, 
a native of Costarica, was hard at work with his own 
hands, trying, by means of a small pump and gutta¬ 
percha tube, to get the water out of a shaft of about 
forty feet deep which had been sunk on the lode. 
Without any knowledge of even the first elements of 
mining, he had spent every penny he could com¬ 
mand on his pet project of developing these mines. 
But a glance at the whole was sufficient to con¬ 
vince us that, unless he should happen to strike a very 
rich spot, all his labour must be in vain. Ramirez 
showed me sixteen dollars, which he told me should 
be the last he intended to lend the mining Curate. 
Prom Ocalca we went to Las Limas, where an 
American, Mr. Greer, and several of his enterprising 
countrymen were carrying on some gold-mining opera¬ 
tions, and where we were received with great hospita¬ 
lity. Mr. Greer had been working for some years at 
Depilto, and fully endorsed the opinion which we had 
been led to form about the mines of that district. 
Another day completed all our inquiries at Mata¬ 
galpa, and on the 27th of April we started for Sebaco, a 
distance of about eight leagues. Our road lay almost 
due west, and would be fit for carts if a few bad places 
were mended. Sebaco is a few miles from the old village 
