of auricular confession.

It is difficult to ascribe this mass of coincidences to mere chance,
and not to see in them traces of connexion, more or less remote, with
Christians. Perhaps these peculiar rites came, with the Mexican system
of astronomy, from Asia; or perhaps the white, bearded men from the
East may have brought them. It is true that such a supposition runs
quite counter to the argument founded on the ignorance of the Mexicans
of common arts known in Europe and Asia. We should have expected
Christian missionaries to have brought with them the knowledge of the
use of iron, and the alphabet. Perhaps our increasing knowledge of the
ancient Mexicans may some day allow us to adopt a theory which shall at
least have the merit of being consistent with itself; but at present
this seems impossible.

CHAPTER XI.

PUEBLA. NOPALUCAN. ORIZABA. POTRERO.

[Illustration: VIEW OF THE VOLCANO ORIZABA.]

We reached Puebla in the afternoon, and found it a fine Spanish city,
with straight streets of handsome stone houses, and paved with
flag-stones. We rather wondered at the _pasadizos_, a kind of arched
stone-pavement across the streets at short intervals, very much
impeding the progress of the carriages, which had to go up and down
them upon inclined planes. In the evening we saw the use of them
however, for a shower of rain came down which turned every street into
a furious river within five minutes after the first drop fell. For half
an hour the pasadizos did their duty, letting the water pass through
underneath, while passengers could get across the streets dryshod. At
last, the flood swept clear along, over bridges and all; but this only
lasted a few minutes, and then the way was practicable again. The
moveable iron bridges on wheels, which are to be seen standing in the
streets of Sicilian cities, ready to be wheeled across them for the
benefit of foot-passengers whenever the carriage-way is flooded, are on
the whole a better arrangement.

We should never have thought, from looking at Puebla, that it had just
been undergoing a siege; for, beyond a few patches of whitewash in the
great square, where the cannon-balls had knocked the houses about,
there were no traces of it.

We made many enquiries about the siege, and found nothing to invalidate
our former estimate of twenty-five killed,--one per cent of the number
stated in the government manifestos. Among the casualties we heard of
an Englishman who