After mass we rode out to a mound that had attracted our attention a day or two before, and which proved to be a fort or temple, or probably both combined.  There were no remains to be found there except the usual fragments of pottery and obsidian.  Then we returned to the hacienda to say good-bye to our friends there, before starting on our journey back to Mexico.  All the population were hard at work amusing themselves, and the shop was doing a roaring trade in glasses of aguardiente.  The Indian who had been our guide for some days past had opened a Monte bank with the dollars we had given him, and was sitting on the ground solemnly dealing cards one by one from the bottom of a dirty pack, a crowd of gamblers standing or sitting in a semicircle before him, silently watching the cards and keeping a vigilant eye upon their stakes which lay on the ground before the banker.  Other parties were busy at the same game in other parts of the open space before the shop, which served as the great square for the colony.

Under the arcades in front of the shop a fandango was going on, though it was quite early in the afternoon.  A man and a woman stood facing each other, an old man tinkled a guitar, producing a strange, endless, monotonous tune, and the two dancers stamped with their feet, and moved their arms and bodies about in time to the music, throwing themselves into affected and voluptuous attitudes which evidently met with the approval of the bystanders, though to us, who did not see with Indian eyes, they seemed anything but beautiful.  When the danseuse had tired out one partner, another took his place.  An admiring crowd stood round or sat on the stone benches, smoking cigarettes, and looking on gravely and silently, with evident enjoyment.  Just as we saw it, it would go on probably through half the night, one couple, or perhaps two, keeping it up constantly, the rest looking on and refreshing themselves from time to time with raw spirits.  Though inferior to the Eastern dancing, it resembled it most strikingly, my companion said.  It has little to do with the really beautiful and artistic dancing of Old Spain, but seems to be the same that the people delighted in long before they ever saw a white man.  Montezuma’s palace contained a perfect colony of professional dancers, whose sole business was to entertain him with their performances, which only resembled those of the Old World because human nature is similar everywhere, and the same wants and instincts often find their development in the same way among nations totally separated from each other.

We left the natives to their amusement, and started on our twenty miles ride.  By the time the evening had fairly begun to close in upon us, we crossed the crest of a hill and had a dim view of a valley below us, but there were no signs of Chalma or its convent.  We let our horses find their way as well as they could along the rocky path, and got down into the valley.  A light behind us made us turn round, and we saw a