nd.
While perfectly free to leave his master if he can pay this debt, he
rarely succeeds in obtaining a release. No right of corporal punishment
is allowed by law, but whipping is practiced upon most of the estates.

The highways throughout the country are numerous, but generally are
rough, and there is but little regular communication between the various
towns. From the cities of Merida and Campeachy, public conveyances leave
at stated times for some of the more important towns; but travellers to
other points are obliged to depend on private transportation. A railroad
from Merida to the port of Progreso, a distance of sixteen miles, was in
process of being built, but the writer is not aware of its completion.

The peninsula is now divided into the States of Yucatan, with a
population of 282,634, with Merida for a capital, and Campeachy, with a
population of 80,366, which has the city of Campeachy as its capital.
The government is similar to our state governments, but is liable to be
controlled by military interference. The States are dependent upon the
central government at Mexico, and send deputies to represent them in the
congress of the Republic. In the south-western part of the country there
is a district very little known, which is inhabited by Indians who have
escaped from the control of the whites and are called Sublevados. These
revolted Indians, whose number is estimated at 139,731, carry on a
barbarous war, and make an annual invasion into the frontier towns,
killing the whites and such Indians as will not join their fortunes.
With this exception, the safety of life and property is amply protected,
and seems to be secured, not so much by the severity of the laws, as by
the peaceful character of the inhabitants of all races. The trade of the
country, except local traffic, is carried on by water. Regular steam
communication occurs monthly between New York and Progreso, the port of
Merida, via Havana, and occasionally barques freighted with corn, hides,
hemp and other products of the country, and also carrying a small number
of passengers, leave its ports for Havana, Vera Cruz and the United
States. Freight and passengers along the coast are transported in flat
bottomed canoes. Occasional consignments of freight and merchandise
arrive by ship from France, Spain and other distant ports.

The cities of Merida and Campeachy are much like Havana in general
appearance. The former has a population of 23,500, is the r