headed by the alcalde with his staff of office, who was followed by his alguacils and mayores, each carrying a long white stick. They stopped at house after house, apparently giving some directions to the inmates, and as they passed us the alcalde civilly wished us "buenas noches"; then a little further on they halted and an alguacil clambering up a wall stood on the top and in a loud clear voice, which seemed to travel up the hillsides, called out the instructions for the work to be put in hand on the morrow, and repeated the Municipal orders for the week. After a moment's pause he was answered by a voice far away in the distance, then by another in an opposite quarter of the town, and when all was quiet again the Indians ceremoniously bade one another good night and the procession dispersed. This, we learnt, is the usual custom on a Sunday night, and in the stillness of the fading daylight it was a curious and impressive ceremony.
Next morning we were awakened by the arrival of the school-boys, whose class-room was next door: each little fellow trotted up the steps with a little bundle of wood faggots on his back, which he deposited outside the door, and then took his seat on the wooden bench within. They were the quaintest little creatures imaginable, dressed just like their fathers; but their strange black garments were in indifferent repair, and the red-and-white handkerchiefs round their heads looked as though they might have been handed down from father to son. There they sat on the bench as still as mice, with their thin black legs dangling down, each one with a yellow-covered dog-eared schoolbook in his hand, in which he buried his face when overcome with bashfulness at the sight of us. About 7 o'clock the schoolmaster came in to call the roll, and as each boy answered his name he shouldered his bundle of faggots and demurely trotted off with it to the schoolmaster's house and deposited it in the kitchen. Thus having done their duty and given the schoolmaster his week's supply of firewood, they seated themselves on the bench again, buried their faces in the yellow-covered books, and never stirred for three whole hours! during which time the schoolmaster sat outside the school-room and chatted to Gorgonio and Santos. Perhaps after all the master's absence or presence did not make much difference, for he owned to us that he could not speak the Indian language, and his pupils knew no Spanish.
As we were in occupation of their school-room the girls were given a holiday, and we saw them only at a distance, for they always took to their heels on our approach.
There is a school-house in every village, and the Government really seems to do its best to give the Indians some education, but the difficulties are great. Sometimes it is the Indian parents who refuse to send their children to school, fearing that if they learn to read and write and speak
