abashes, prettily decorated and carved, and full of sweetmeats.
There were ten or twelve of these little bowls on the table, each with
a different kind of "tuck" in it. We inquired where all those good
things came from, and learnt that making them was one of the favourite
occupations of the Mexican nuns, who keep their brethren in the
monasteries well supplied. At last the good monk went away to his
duties and left us, when I could not resist the temptation of having a
look at the little books in blue and green paper covers which were
lying on the table with the sweetmeat-bowls and the venerable old
missal. They proved to be all French novels done into Spanish, and
"Notre-Dame de Paris" was lying open (under a sheet of paper); so I
conclude that our visit had interrupted the sub-prior while deep in
that improving work.

Presently a monk came to conduct us down into the refectory, and there
they gave us an uncommonly good supper of wonderful Mexican stews,
red-hot as usual, and plenty of good Spanish wine withal. The great
dignitaries of the cloister did not appear, but some fifteen or twenty
monks were at table with us, and never tired of questioning us--exactly
in the same fashion that the ladies of the harem questioned Dona Juana.
We delighted them with stories of the miraculous Easter fire at
Jerusalem, and the illumination of St. Peter's, of the Sistine chapel
and the Pope, and we parted for the night in high good humour.

Next morning a monk attached himself to us as our cicerone, a fine
young fellow with a handsome face, and no end of fun in him.

Now that we saw the convent by daylight, we were delighted with the
beauty of its situation. The broad fertile valley grows narrower and
narrower until it becomes a gorge in the mountains; and here the
convent is built, with the mountain-stream running through its
beautiful gardens, and turning the wheel of the convent-mill before it
flows on into the plain to fertilize the broad lands of the reverend
fathers.

When we had visited the gardens and the stables, our young monk brought
us back to the great church of the convent, where we took our places
near the monks, who had mustered in full force to be present at the
dancing. Presently the music arrived, an old man with a harp, and a
woman with a violin; and then came the dancers, eight Indian boys with
short tunics and head-dresses of feathers, and as many girls with white
dresses, and garlands of flowers on their he