This part of Yucatan was covered with a thin light kind of brushwood which grew to a height of about twelve feet. Our path was cut through this bush which excluded all view to the right or left. Occasionally we passed through a few acres of open land where the Indians were cultivating some crops, but the soil was poor and stony. At noon we arrived at a farm; the proprietor was inclined to be hospitable and gave me food and shelter. I was suffering from a recurrence of what I had endured at Campeachy and could scarcely bear the fatigue of the journey, especially as the rays of the nearly vertical sun were very powerful. During the afternoon, whilst resting in the shade, I listened to the loud, discordant, and grating sounds pronounced by the Indians around me. The language spoken was Maya, which has been ascertained to be the parent stock of most of the languages and dialects spoken in Guatemala, Yucatan and the bordering territories. I asked my host to give me a specimen of their dialect. He replied that he would tell me what had happened in the morning, and he leant forward and said:—“Ti lé kin béhilá, kuch yuayé humpel tzul ingles, bin tiar ten. Tumentin, katah uchi y etel tin káhol ta hatchutz apockzi chalé; katin kámá tin nayle, katin sah balu hante kati álá téné bin ku bétic Uxmal, tacthoh cásumac tuh lú mil.” “This day came here an English Señor and spoke to me. Having questioned him and knowing him to be of a good heart, I received him in my house and gave him to eat. Then he told me that he was going to Uxmal, and thence to Merida and afterwards to his own land.” Towards the end of the day, when the sun was low, I ventured out of the hut, mounted my horse, and pushed forward rapidly towards Uxmal. After passing through several plantations of sugar-cane attached to small Indian farms, we reached some rising ground and I saw, about four miles distant towards the east, the great building, called the Casa del Gobernador, with its terraces and adjacent pyramids standing out high and distinct. The sun had disappeared below the horizon, and the sky was brilliant with the vivid colouring of a tropical sunset. The Casa del Gobernador was clear and well defined in the midst of this magnificent frame of evening splendour, looking scarcely less beautiful than a Greek temple on some lofty headland, when seen at twilight from Ægean seas. It was getting dark when we slowly passed round the base of a Teocalli, and it was night when we halted at the hacienda. The proprietor and the agent were both absent, but the mayor-domo received me with much kindness. He gave me a large room next to one which he told me had been occupied by the Empress Charlotte when she visited Uxmal in 1866. The next morning, after giving Anastasio directions to join me at the Casa del Gobernador and to bring with him my hammock and provisions, I walked out to the ruins. [Illustration: CASA DEL GOBERNADOR. CASA DE LAS TORTUGAS. CASA DE LAS PALOMAS. UXMAL.]