After leaving Escuintla the road skirts around the base of Agua and begins to climb up the mountain range. In the next thirteen miles the road ascends more than twenty-five hundred feet, which takes it into another zone. The track crosses numerous large and deep gorges. The tangled, tropical forests have disappeared and coffee and cane plantations become numerous. The smooth slopes of Agua and Fuego are rich in cultivation. At nearly every station women appear with all kinds of fruits for sale, as well as eggs, cakes, _dulces_ (candies), etc. Never did I eat more delicious pineapples than those secured right here. They were great, luscious, toothsome fruits. Oranges cannot compare with the cultivated and developed fruit of California, but bananas were fine and much better than the fruit generally sold at our own fruit stands. Lake Amatitlan is passed and a pretty little body of water it is nestling in the hollow of the hills. There are many boiling springs near its shores, which show how near it is to the unsettled forces of nature. The washwomen take advantage of this water heated by nature, as it saves them trouble and fuel and is always ready for use. The villages become more numerous as the city is approached, and factory buildings and the white walls of the _haciendas_ which dot the landscape here and there make a pleasing contrast. Some lava beds are passed showing that nature has created disturbances in the past quite freely. At last the final ridge is passed, and there, nestling in the valley, is the City of Guatemala. Its situation is somewhat similar to the valley of Mexico, though it is not nearly so large; neither are the surrounding barriers of the mountains so high; nor are the lakes present, which gave the City of Mexico the name of the New-World Venice. A couple of years ago it was impossible to travel by rail all the way from Guatemala City to the Gulf coast, and it was necessary to leave the city on the back of that sadly-wise, much-neglected creature—the mule, for there was no carriage road. This method of travel entails hardships, but I believe that it has its compensations. Byron says: “Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase, And marvel men should quit their easy chair, The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace, Oh, there is sweetness in the mountain air, And life, that bloated ease can never hope to share.” [Illustration: THE VOLCANO AGUA.] Two other Americans, residents of the country, were going and invited me to join them. The liveries wanted three hundred dollars each from us for three saddle mules, a cargo mule and mozo (servant). An old Indian in the country furnished the same for sixty-five dollars each—just about five dollars in gold—which was cheap enough for a four days’ journey to the railroad and back.