ugh he had fallen into the habits of the native
population, and wore neither shirt nor shoes, he entertained for them
a superlative contempt, which he expressed in a strange jumble of bad
English and worse Spanish. He had been with Perry on Lake Erie, and
afterwards on board various vessels of war, in some capacity which he
did not explain with great clearness, but which he evidently intended
should be understood as but little lower than that of commander. A
glass of brandy made him eloquent, and he took a position in the
middle of the _cabildo_, and gave us an oration on the people of
Honduras, in a style singularly grotesque and demonstrative. In
broken and scarcely intelligible English,--for he had nearly
forgotten the language of his youth,--he denounced them as "thieves
and liars," and then asked them, "Is it not true?" Imagining,
doubtless, that he was declaiming their praises, the enthusiastic
assemblage responded, _"Si! si!"_ (Yes! yes!) Not a crime so gross,
nor a trait of character so degraded, but he laid it to their charge,
receiving always the same vehement response, _"Si! Si!"_

We got rid of our _paisano_ with difficulty, and only under a promise
to visit his _chacra_, somewhere in the vicinity, next morning. But
we saw no more of him,--not much to our regret; for John Robinson, I
fear, was sadly addicted to brandy, of which our supply was far too
small to admit of honoring many such drafts as he had made the
preceding evening.

One and a half miles to the southeast of Aramacina is a ledge of
sandstone rock, with a smooth vertical face, which is covered over
with figures, deeply cut in outline. This ledge forms one side of a
rural amphitheatre overlooking the adjacent valley, and is by nature
a spot likely to be selected as a "sacred place" by the Indians. It
faces towards the west, and from all parts of the amphitheatre, which
may have answered the purposes of a temple, the morning sun would
appear to rise directly over the rock. The engravings in some places
are much defaced or worn by time, so that they cannot be made out;
but generally they are deep and distinct,--so deep, indeed, that I
used those which run horizontally as steps whereby to climb up the
face of the ledge. I should say that they were two and a half inches
deep. A portion had been effaced by a rude quarry which the people of
Aramacina had opened here to obtain stone for their church.

Some of the figures are easily recognizable as th