106 GUATEMALA. 
the afternoon Senor Prado took us to a mound which the 
new roadway had just grazed ; and together we dug out 
fragments of fine pottery and bits of human bones much 
decayed, — the lower third of a left femur and a frag¬ 
ment of a pelvis being the most distinctly human. Some 
earthen vessels had been found here and sent to the 
Museo Nacional in Guatemala City. The bones were 
mingled with charcoal and ochre, and often cemented 
together like lime concretions or fulgurites. 
We each had a tumbler of warm milk as a 66 stirrup- 
cup ” when we said our adios to our kind host in the morn¬ 
ing, and soon after six we were on the road again. Here, 
as so often again in the republic, we found that the road¬ 
bed was undergoing active repair. The primitive method 
of removing large rocks and ledges greatly interested us, 
Fires are kept up on and around these obstructions; 
when thoroughly heated, these are left to cool, or the 
cooling is hastened by water. In either case the ham¬ 
merers have easy work. 
The narrower road led among pine-forests, where 
many of the trees had been girdled and were slowly 
decaying,—the comajen being unknown at this elevation. 
Men were cutting timber for the President’s house and 
for a new bridge. A mortise is cut in the end of each 
log, to which the drag-ropes are fastened. We passed a 
pleasant village in the valley below us on our left, and after 
about nine miles of poor road we came to a rapid descent 
of twenty-two hundred feet, so steep that we were obliged 
to lead our mules almost to the bank of the Chixoy, 
where the pier on the side nearest us had been under¬ 
mined in the last flood. The path ended on a narrow 
rock shelf, where was fastened a rude timber frame, from 
