The gates of this city are six, two main entrances and four posterns. Of these Santa Lucia and Palacio, which look toward the west, allow passage to the shore--as also on the north side Santo Domingo and Almacenes give passage to the river. The main gates are distinguished by the names Real and Parian. The latter is situated in the middle of the curtain which faces the northeast between the San Lorenzo and San Gabriel bastions; and inside of it is its guard-station, capacious enough to lodge a company of men. Corresponding to the empty space below, in the upper part it has a spacious sentry-tower, furnished with some cannons, which, by favor of its sides defends the collateral bulwarks--a fortification which, it may be supposed, was placed here in order to make up for the defect of the extraordinary length of this curtain. The outer works of this are thus composed: a crown-work, which masks the gate; a fausse-braye [falsabraga], which extends from the flank of the bastion San Gabriel, until it almost reaches the said gate, there leaving room for a little bridge for communication with the crown-work already mentioned; a ditch, of which we shall treat further on; its covered way, parapet, and palisade, with its esplanade, the whole regularly surrounded, so far as the narrowness of the place permits; and at its foot a quagmire, which serves as an outer ditch. At the end of this, and along its outer margin, extending toward the south, there is a grand highway, which at its beginning is joined with another but small road, which lies between the outer ditch and the river; and both of these connect with a little bridge, next to a small fort which was erected for the guards stationed at the large bridge which, close by, crosses the river.