not ornamental fountain, presents a lively
scene on Sunday, the great market-day. The inn is a fair specimen of a
public house in Spanish America. Around the court-yard, where the beasts
are fed, are three or four rooms to let. They are ventilated only when
opened for travelers. The floor is of brick, but alive with fleas; the
walls are plastered, but veiled with cobwebs. The furniture, of
primitive make and covered with dust, consists of a chair or two, a
table, and a bed of boards covered with a thin straw mat. There is not a
hotel in Ecuador where sheets and towels are furnished. The landlords
are seldom seen; the entire management of the concern is left to a
slovenly Indian boy, who is both cook and hostler. No amount of bribery
will secure a meal in less than two hours. Ten years ago there was not a
posada in the country; now there is entertainment for man and beast at
Guayaquil, Guaranda, Mocha, Ambato, Tacunga, Machachi, and Quito.
Riobamba has a billiard saloon, but no inn.

Leaving Ambato, we breakfasted at Cunchebamba, an Indian village of half
a dozen straw huts. Thence the road for a long distance winds through
vast deposits of volcanic _debris_, the only sign of vegetation being
hedges of aloe and cactus. Arid hills and dreary plains, covered with
plutonic rocks and pumice dust, tell us we are approaching the most
terrible volcano on the earth. Crossing the sources of the Pastassa, we
entered Latacunga,[16] situated on a beautiful plain at the foot of
Cotopaxi, seven hundred feet higher than Ambato. Its average temperature
is 59 deg.. The population, chiefly Indians, numbers about fifteen thousand.
It is the dullest city in Ecuador, without the show of enterprise or
business. Not even grass grows in the streets--the usual sign of life in
the Spanish towns. It is also one of the filthiest; and though it has
been many times thoroughly shaken by earthquakes, and buried under
showers of volcanic dust, it is still the paradise of fleas, which have
survived every revolution. Ida Pfeiffer says that, after a night's rest
in Latacunga, she awoke with her skin marked all over with red spots, as
if from an eruptive disease. We can certify that we have been tattoed
without the night's rest. The town has a most stupid and forlorn aspect.
Half of it is in ruins. It was four times destroyed between 1698 and
1797. In 1756 the Jesuit church was thrown down, though its walls were
five feet thick. The houses are of one story,