Colonel assured us it would be impossible to ride | lower valleys. Dots on the snow proved to be through such an intricate and broken country enormous masses of lava protruding above the by night, which decided us to sleep at Ameca frozen level, while below, bald precipices, 3000 and start by moonlight early next morning. feet high, cracked in the form of obelisks and This detention, however, was not unprofitable. pinnacles, seemed to stand out as grotesque We found two Indians who had made the as-pillars wrought by the Titans from the wreck cent of the volcano, and who offered for a mod- of matter, in mythological architecture, to superate price to serve as guides. Popocatepetl, port the aspiring dome of snow that surmounted in fact, is the one feature-the lion of Ameca; them. To many in Mexico this scene is fafor it not only yields sulphur and ice, two mark-miliar, and several local daubers have attemptetable commodities in Mexico, but the fame of ed to transfer it to canvas. Schoefft, a Hunthe mountain which advertises itself to all this garian artist, at the last accounts was preparing part of the country by its colossal proportions, for a journey thither from Mexico, and will unattaches also to the town, whose corporate lim-doubtedly execute a fine painting. An Amerits extend quite up to the snow region. From the lower edge of the frozen belt, on the western side, the Indians from time immemorial have cut out blocks of ice, which, enveloped in dried grass, and packed on the backs of donkeys, are brought to the level country, and thence sent to the capital by the Chalco Canal.

ican naturally wishes that our own Church might add " Popocatepetl" to his "Niagara" and "Heart of the Andes." But as the sun declined the scene became still more wonderful. Then the heights were illumined as if by supernatural light. Streaks of gold, crimson, and pale bluc opened along the slanting ice-fields, painting them with wreaths of parti-colored flame, hanging and swaying among the feathery clouds that swept past the mountain peak. That peak seemed to be soaring into mid-heaven-into the very desolation of loneliness and cold, where the silence is only broken by the hurtling of hail, the sough of the wind among the frozen gullies, or the solemn thunder booming along the snowy crags. These fires lingered last upon the apex of Popocatepetl, when, as if by magic, the scene vanished like a dissolving view and gave place to the spectral volcano-ice-crowned and shrouded in dull vaporous clouds. Very soon the valley was wrapped in gloom, and the extinguishing of the lights showed that the little world of Ameca had followed the example of nature and sunk to rest. As we were to make an early start we rolled ourselves in blankets and coats on the floor of the cabilda and slept with that soundness which health and exercise generally insure, however rough the couch or primitive the apartment.

The most imposing view of the two mountains is had from the Valley of Ameca. Being only twenty-five miles distant in a direct line, the towering Popocatepetl seems to spring almost from the town itself, which is prettily adorned with shade trees and traversed by rivulets fresh from the snowy deposits above. Along the margins of these streams innumerable flowers grow the year around without cultivation. The houses, however, are the usual Spanish American adobe, and about equally divided as to possessory right between pigs, fleas, Indians, and snarling curs. This elevated plateau is bounded on the western side by a hill known as Sacra Monte, whence the famous Ameca Valley sunset is viewed to the best advantage. Popocatepetl from this point bears by compass E.S.E., and Iztaccihuatl N.N.E. The intervening ranges are covered with cedar, oak, juniper, ash, and willow, all in full leaf, and presenting from the valley a variety of shades, from the tender leaves of the underbrush to the deepest gloom of the ever- Prompt to the minute, at two in the morngreen woods. A solemn stillness reigned over ing, a knock at the door announced that our the whole scene, only disturbed at intervals by escort were awaiting us, and after a hasty prepthe sighing of the winds through the forest or aration by the light of a tallow-candle, we found the roar of some far off waterfall. Above and the little troop of five soldiers, a corporal, and beyond this amphitheatre of wood and dale the two Indian guides all mounted and ready in whole eastern side of the sky appeared as a the patio. The moon, in its second quarter, vast escarpment of snow and ice, reflecting was high in the heavens, and enabled us to disfaint iridescent colors in the rays of the set- cern the grave faces of our companions, with ting sun. Rising thousands of feet above the carbines slung across their backs, and rigged lesser ranges, the sides of the mountain, when in the dress of the Mexican national cavalry. examined with telescope, revealed fissures in The air was so keen that we were glad enough the declivities and huge gorges, down whose to get some hot coffee that had been prepared steeps plunging cataracts were tearing their way, for us, and then, lighting our puros, we pulled carrying snow, ice, and rocks. The peak was on gloves and mufflers, gave the word and trotat times curtained in clouds, but it was evi- ted out of the silent village-the guides ahead, dent a great wind was at work there, for occa- and the cavalry bringing up the rear, and set sionally these would be whirled aside, display-out toward the volcano, which we could barely ing again the white summit in bold relief against the sky. Below the snow line we could make out with the glass lofty rocks-some upright, like foundry stacks, and others inclining as if ready to topple over among the pines in the

distinguish by the feeble moonlight.

For many leagues around the base of Popocatepetl evidences of ancient eruptions form the feature of the country. The cultivated lands along the road we were following seemed

this position one realizes the appropriateness of the Aztec appellation-"The White Woman." The broken surface of its crest, which is nearly 16,000 feet above the sea, extends for several miles in snowy undulations, and forms, with startling accuracy, the outlines of a recumbent female figure under a shroud, with the knees raised and the head thrown back. Even the rigid features in the repose of death are perfectly delineated, as one would imagine the profile of a corpse staring heavenward, and covered with a winding-sheet. This appearance is presented with sufficient distinctness from the Valley of Mexico; but the life-like, or rather death-like, fidelity of the apparition is best observed from the table-lands between Tlamacas and Ameca. Iztaccihuatl (or Iztactepetl, as it was called in the more remote ages of Indian civilization, before the time of the Toltecs) was once the centre of aboriginal adoration. Sahegun, the earliest of the Spanish writers, who commenced gathering the materials for his history of ancient America shortly after the conquest, states that all the nations of Mexico repaired, at stated seasons, to Iztae

to be a mixture of loam, ashes, and scoria, producing, however, even at this altitude, good crops of the cereals. The village of Ameca is built upon volcanic rock, and the walls of its church and houses are of the same igneous material. The whole lower region, at least the part we traversed, is volcanic in character. In fact, the streets of the towns, in all directions for a great distance, are paved with stones thrown out by the crater; and in the garden walls at Chalco we saw masses of melted rock half a ton in weight, almost realizing those descriptions of battles in which the gods hurled the mountains at each other. Even in the city of Mexico, the great Aztec calendar, forming a part of the wall of the cathedral, is of this rock; but that may have been brought from any of the nearer volcanoes. At the foot of the eastern slope of Popocatepetl, where Humboldt determined its elevation, he found a mysterious kind of lava-field, consisting, he says, of "black partially upraised lava-blocks of a fearfully wild appearance, and only sparingly coated here and there with lichens, contrasting with the yellowish-white coat of pumice-stone which covers every thing for a long distance round." | cihuatl to worship the God of the Mountains, On the northern and western slopes we found deserts of sand and ashes, though broken lava, as above described, was also scattered far and wide.

and seemed to hold the "White Woman" in even greater reverence than her towering mate of Popocatepetl. The fatal zeal of the monks doomed to destruction every relic of Aztec idolOur course was through a vernal lane, ex- atry that came within their reach, so that by tending for some two leagues along a gradually the end of the sixteenth century comparativerising valley, with barley-fields on either hand, ly little had survived their insensate rage; but and a thick growth of poplar and willow serv- a few zealous antiquarians were found even in ing as dividing fences, while the hedges of that age of flame and sword, who labored to cactus and maguey, and the matted, thorny stay the general devastation, and to save some vegetation peculiar to these llanos formed an vestiges of that strange and isolated civilization impenetrable protection for the crops. Ap- so suddenly unveiled by Cortéz, and so swiftly proaching the foot-hills of the sierras, we passed to disappear before the fanaticism of the cross. the last evidences of civilization-the hacienda The unhappy Aztecs saw the annihilation not of Tomacoco, where are a few stone buildings only of their nationality and race, but even the and some ruins which were once a church. In gradual extinction of their literature, arts, and less than an hour we had left the plain, and refinement. Some of the learned Indians sought were urging our horses up the craggy hills that to preserve at least the outlines of their history lie below the mountain ranges beyond. We and sciences in neatly written maguey manuwere now in the pine region proper, which here scripts, while others hid away in caverns preforms in open forests-the trees averaging about cious sculptured tablets and curious picturetwo and a half feet in diameter, and perhaps writing, with the same object in view. Witheighty feet in height. The ground was cov- in a few months an immense "pantheon," or ered with the cones and leaves, and the air had tomb, has been discovered in the side of Izthe peculiar aroma of the pine woods of Califor- taccihuatl among the tangled forests that skirt nia, Oregon, and New England. A keen breeze its western base. Its exact size or shape has from the heights made us wrap ourselves closer yet to be ascertained, for it has been penetrated in blankets and coats, and sometimes we dis-only a few hundred yards; but at that distance, mounted and ran through the moonlit forest for exercise. Ice-cold streams, indicating their snowy origin, brawled along the path or tumbled in cascades among the roots, where sheets of thin ice could be seen on either bank. Sometimes we came to openings where the tufts of thin grass were silvered with frost.

the extent beyond-reaching into gloomy, vaulted caverns, resounding with solemn far-sounding echoes-seems almost illimitable. Multitudes of skeletons, placed upright against the walls, stretch in grizzly ranks into the unexplored inner darkness, and a variety of grotesque, hideous idols, beasts, birds, nondescripts, and household pottery fill the niches and cover the ground. The discovery was aecidental, and may be the forerunner of others yet more interesting.

All interest was now centred in the crown

ination of our ride-to where we must part with the escort-laughter and loud talking ceased; for each was inwardly cogitating over the nature of the task before us. Our respect for the volcano increased as we surveyed the scorious slopes and burnished snow - fields overtopping the surrounding clouds.

At this point we had the best view of the volcano proper that is, from the true base where it rises a distinct cone from among the offshooting ranges. At a great distance the lower body of the mass is indistinguishable from the ing glory of the Andes, whose spurs we were adjacent mountains, upon whose capitals the slowly scaling by winding paths amidst the si- great cupola is raised; but the majestic prolence of the primeval wilderness. Whichever portions, always best estimated from afar, are way this zigzag climbing turned our faces, there lost upon a nearer approach, for the same stood the majestic Popocatepetl-a painting in reason that an ant crawling up the side of the sky-gleaming like a vast helmet of ice, and a castle can form but little idea of the mass from this point of view assuming a cold, blue he is trying to surmount. From this plateau steel color, indescribably forbidding and dreary the openings in the woods gave an uninterin its aspect. As we approached the term-rupted view. If we were disappointed at not

being able to witness the sunrise from the sum- | been warned against packs of wolves and lions mit, as we had promised ourselves in Mexico, we now enjoyed a surprise of equal beauty in the opalescent changes shooting along the iceregion; for, as the sun ascended, the heights were ablaze with light before the gloom had fairly left the deep glens and recesses of the lower country. Below the snow line we could distinguish with the glass the regular gradation of foliage, from the stunted pines down to the larger growths in the valleys, and thence to the climate where oaks, juniper, poplars, yellow cedars, and willows present a nobler form of vegetation. We were now at an elevation of about 13,000 feet above the sea, and, to commence our task, must first descend to the plain of Tlamacas, about 1000 feet below. Through all this pine region, which for several hours we had patiently threaded, we saw no evidence of animal life-not even birds. At Chalco we had

(the latter probably the cougar or panther), but we met with no traces of either wild or domestic animals. Sheep and calves, however, are continually destroyed in the haciendas around the volcano's base by wolves, whose gaunt forms are sometimes seen sneaking among the matted jungles. At certain seasons the guides told us it was necessary to keep fires burning all night at the sheep corrals to scare these prowlers away. Horses and mules tethered in lonely places are attacked by troops of wolves; and in the morning the owner find only the riata, and a neatly-polished anatomy of what the day before was a prancing steed. As we advanced the pines gradually dwarfed into the puniest forms of trees with ugly gnarled branches and rough bark, and a variety of small underbrush, of which we cut a few specimens for examination, but lost them