I have endeavored to give most briefly the chief matters of importance relating to the four republics that, with Guatemala, constitute Central America. I am well aware that I have turned, that I can turn but little light on the darkness; too little is known of the country, beyond its trade and political relations to the rest of the world. Volcanoes, earthquakes, and revolutions have popularly been associated with the whole region, and public taste has been turned away from such unpleasant outbreaks of subterranean fires or human passions. The time will come when these regions, far more fertile and accessible than those African wilds that for a score of years have interested, strangely enough, both explorer and capitalist, will claim the attention due their natural merits; and the fertile plains will be the garden and orchard of the United States,—not necessarily by political annexation, but by commercial intercourse. All our sugar, all our coffee, all our rice, all our chocolate, all our india-rubber ought to come from Central America, where these products can be raised better and cheaper than in any other country; and next to these staples, the subsidiary fruits, as oranges, plantains, bananas, pines, limes, granadillas, aguacates, and dozens of others now unknown to commerce, ought to come to us from Limon, Puerto Cortez, and Livingston. These are to be obtained in Guatemala of better quality and in better order than in the West Indies. Louisiana would then perhaps give up the unnatural cultivation of sugar, and Florida cease her useless striving to raise really good oranges, and both States turn to the products they are better fitted for raising. I will ask you to go with me through the republic of Guatemala, and to see it, so far as you can, with my eyes; and until that journey is ended, we will leave the story of the old times, the present system of government, the ethnology, the volcanoes, the flora and fauna, to chapters by themselves, even if the unsystematic arrangement should savor strongly of the irregularity of the land we journey through. [Illustration: Luciano Calletano (Captain at Chocon).] CHAPTER II. THE ATLANTIC COAST AND ITS CONNECTIONS. As the steamer anchors far from the shore at the port of Livingston, the traveller sees almost exactly what the Spaniards saw,—earth, sky, and sea, so little change have four centuries wrought on the outer shores of Guatemala. Northward are the picturesque hills of British Honduras, backed by the blue summits of the Cockscomb range; southward the majestic San Gil, bearing like another Atlas the clouds on his broad shoulders; eastward the low Cays, covered with the feathery coconuts; before him the shore, here marked by a long limestone cliff crowned by the palm-sheltered houses of the Caribs, while farther to the westward rise the Santa Cruz mountains. The yellow waters of some great river lave the vessel’s sides; but no break is visible in the landward horizon.