is generally covered with a dense growth of forest, unless artificial clearings have been made.  Covies of birds, like quail, were seen here and there, along the road, and at one point a handsome green snake, a yard or more in length, glided across the way.  Snakes are said to be common, and among them several are venomous—­the rattlesnake, the coral-snake, and most dreaded of all, a little dark serpent a foot or so in length, with an enormous head, whose bite is said to be immediately fatal.  There are also many tree-snakes, as thick as a man’s arm.  In the forest, mountain-lions are rare, but “tigers” are common.  We found Santa Maria to be an extensive hacienda, and the sugar-mill was a large structure, well supplied with modern machinery, and turning out a large amount of product.  We saw a few of the indian hands, went through the factory, and were shown through the owner’s house, which has beautiful running water and baths, though there is little furniture, and nothing of what we would consider decoration.  It was after dark before we started to town, and when we got there we found two wedding parties waiting for the padre’s services.

The promised crowd filled the market Sunday, and our work went finely.  Between the town officials and the priest, subjects were constantly supplied.  Among the indians who presented themselves for measurement was old Manuel, sacristan from Xaya; he is a h’men, and we had hoped that he would show us the method of using the sastun, or divining crystal.  He is a full-blood, and neither in face nor manner shows the least emotion.  Automatic in movement, he is quiet and phlegmatic in manner; having assumed the usual indian pose for rest, a squat position in which no part of the body except the feet rests upon the ground, or any support, he sat quietly, with the movement of scarcely a muscle, for hours at a time.  He sang for us the invocation to the winds of the four quarters, which they use in the ceremony of planting time.  Though he is frequently employed to say the “milpa mass” and to conjure, he claims that he never learned how to use the sastun, but told us that another h’men in his village knew it well.

One of the padre’s companions has been ill ever since he came to Yucatan; Sunday he suffered so greatly that a doctor was sent for in haste.  Nothing was told us as to what his trouble might be, but personally I suspected that he had the small-pox.  In connection with his illness, we learned for the first time that another companion of the priest, brought from Spain, died in the room I was occupying, less than two weeks before, from yellow fever.  We had known that one of his companions had died of yellow fever, but supposed it was some months earlier.  Toward evening the priest was sent for by a neighbor, who needed the last service.  On the padre’s return, we learned that this person was believed to be dying from vomito.  For a moment we were