ied,
and on the right, facing the great garden of the convent, all the
cloisters are untenanted, dismantled, and desolate; the doors and
windows are broken, and grass and weeds are growing out of the floors.
The garden had once been in harmony with the grandeur and style of the
convent, and now shares its fortunes. Its wells and fountains,
parterres and beds of flowers, are all there, but neglected and running
to waste, weeds, oranges, and lemons growing wildly together, and our
horses were turned into it loose, as into a pasture.

Associated in my mind with this ruined convent, so as almost to form
part of the building, is our host, the pride and love of the village,
the cura Carillo. He was past forty, tall and thin, with an open,
animated, and intelligent countenance, manly, and at the same time
mild, and belonged to the once powerful order of Franciscan friars, now
reduced in this region to himself and a few companions. After the
destruction of the convent at Merida, and the scattering of the friars,
his friends procured for him the necessary papers to enable him to
secularize, but he would not abandon the brotherhood in its waning
fortunes, and still wore the long blue gown, the cord, and cross of the
Franciscan monks. By the regulations of his order, all the receipts of
his curacy belonged to the brotherhood, deducting only forty dollars
per month for himself. With this pittance, he could live and extend
hospitality to strangers. His friends urged him to secularize, engaging
to procure for him a better curacy, but he steadily refused; he never
expected to be rich, and did not wish to be; he had enough for his
wants, and did not desire more. He was content with his village and
with the people; he was the friend of everybody, and everybody was his
friend; in short, for a man not indolent, but, on the contrary,
unusually active both in mind and body, he was, without affectation or
parade, more entirely contented with his lot than any man I ever knew.
The quiet and seclusion of his village did not afford sufficient
employment for his active mind, but, fortunately for science and for
me, and strangely enough as it was considered, he had turned his
attention to the antiquities of the country. He could neither go far
from home, nor be absent long, but he had visited every place within
his reach, and was literally an enthusiast in the pursuit. His friends
smiled at this folly, but, in consideration of his many good qualit