GUATEMALA CITY. 
173 
and sank down powerless by the road. Fortunately we 
were near a brook. We poured cool water on her head, 
and she soon recovered. We met great herds of cattle 
on their way from the dry uplands to the juicy pastures 
of the lowlands, and also stages full of miserable people, 
shaken and dusty, and with the look one might fancy 
a soul in purgatory would assume, — always supposing 
it had a face. 
The Falls of the Michatoya by the roadside relieved the 
monotony of the way, but were not so beautiful as I had 
expected from Stephens’s account. We found the rails of 
the ferro-carril laid as far as Palin; 1 and it was graded 
beyond Amatitlan, on its way to Guatemala City, which 
it has since (1886) reached. Basaltic rock was abundant 
along the road, and so were beehives, — generally made 
from a hollow log and hung horizontally under the eaves 
of the houses. Honey, costing us a medio a quart, was 
very good ; wax, however, is a more valuable product, as 
it plays a very important part in the service of religion, 
masses costing so many pounds of wax candles. The bees 
seem to be quite inoffensive, and the hives often hung 
close to the house-doors. Sugar estates were common in 
this district, the water-power being generally furnished 
by the Michatoya river. The chimneys of the ingenios 
did not indicate severe or frequent earthquakes here. 
Oranges, not of the finest quality, sold at three cents a 
dozen. Late in the afternoon we passed some cochineal 
plantations in a rather neglected state, and soon after 
1 Palin is the market-garden and orchard of the metropolis, and the fruit 
is good, but not cultivated with any care ; nor is there here or elsewhere in 
Guatemala any attempt to procure new and choice varieties of either fruits or 
vegetables. 
