ACROSS THE CONTINENT, WESTWARD TO COBAN. 89 
coffee-trees, and were told that here there are three 
blossomings in May, and as many harvestings in Decem¬ 
ber 5 the first and third 
are small, while the sec¬ 
ond is large. Roses were 
even finer than at Ta- 
mahd; and a little girl 
gave me a bunch of a Roof Tile . 
kind much like the old- 
fashioned cabbage-rose. Most of the inhabitants are 
Indios of the Poconchi tribe. 
The facade of the church is ornamented with dumpy 
statues of saints, and the main altar is elaborately carved. 
We noticed a picture of three men in the flames of Sheol, 
— whether Hell or Purgatory we could not tell; one wore 
a tiara, another a mitre, while the third had on a plain 
four-cornered canonical cap. In front of the church we 
bought twenty jocotes (Spondias sp.) for a medio. There 
are several varieties of this plum-like fruit, and the red 
is larger and better than the yellow. When quite ripe, 
the rather tender skin contains a juicy yellow pulp 
around a rough stone. From the fermented juice chicha 
is made, — much used as a mild intoxicant, not unlike 
thin cider. 
As we rode out of town we saw that the suburban gar¬ 
dens were much overrun by squash and bean vines. 
Maiz stood fifteen feet high ; far up on the hills we saw 
cornfields ( milpas ), having in their midst dwelling-houses 
almost in the clouds, and seemingly built like swallows’ 
nests against the steep hillside. The campo santo , or 
cemetery, was surrounded by adobe walls, and seemed 
utterly neglected. We had seen in the church,^and now 
