On June 23 I was fortunate enough, while in Popayán, to behold one of the religious celebrations formerly all too numerous in Latin America. It was the _Fiesta del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús_. Troops of soldiers and bands were lined up in front of the cathedral; all were quiet and orderly while the sacred rites were being performed within. Suddenly the doors burst open, bells boomed and jingled, and the contents of the vast church poured through the portals in a steady stream. First came the altar-boys in white surplices and red cassocks, carrying gilded crosses on long poles and lighted tapers in silver holders, followed by the small children, the girls with tinsel wings, resembling tiny angels. Then came the governor of Cauca, the prefect of Popayán and their staffs, each bearing a standard. Next in line were the maidens, covered with large black shawls, or _mantas_, with folded hands and downcast eyes which, however, they were not averse to raising to meet the admiring glances cast by some of the onlookers. The students from the seminaries and a choir of singers preceded a life-size statue of the patron of the feast, borne aloft on the shoulders of stalwart youths; then came the archbishop and the higher ecclesiastics in tall mitres and gorgeously embroidered and glittering robes. Those of the general public who chose to march fell in line behind the bands that followed, chanting prayers. The remainder knelt in the streets with bowed, uncovered heads as the procession passed. All the buildings, even the trees, were gayly decorated with banners, a mixture of the papal and national insignia. Colombia is perhaps the only remaining country in the New World in which religion still dominates the government. If we examine a map of Colombia we will find that the Cerro Munchique, the highest of the mountains in the Western Range, lies directly west of Popayán. There is an exceedingly difficult pass across the Cordillera at this point, leading to a place called the Cocal, still far distant from the coast. A trail was also being opened a short distance to the south leading to the Rio Micai. When this is completed it will require a four days’ journey on mules to the river; then two days in canoes on the Micai, said to contain many rapids and to flow through country inhabited by savage tribes, before the coast is reached. A day’s ride from Popayán took us to El Tambo, and at noon the following day we were in the Indian village of Chapa at the very base of Munchique. A heavy electrical storm delayed our departure until noon the next day. There were but a dozen or fifteen adobe huts in the village, and during the height of the tempest one of these suddenly collapsed into a heap of mud and straw; the occupants barely escaped by fleeing into the deluge when the buckling walls apprised them of their danger.