and shoulders shrouded in the
mottled serape, his black broad-brimmed hat darkening still more his
swarth face--goes the _poblano_, the denizen of the adobe hut. He shuns
the centre of the piazza, keeping around the walls; but at intervals his
eyes are turned towards the well with a look of mingled fierceness and
fear. He reaches a doorway--it is silently opened by a hand within--he
enters quickly, and seems glad to get out of sight. A little
afterwards, I can catch a glimpse of his sombre face dimly visible
behind the bars of the reja.

At distant corners, I descry small groups of his class, all similarly
costumed in calzoneros, striped blankets, and glaze hats; all, like him,
wearing uneasy looks. They gesticulate little, contrary to their usual
habit, and converse only in whispers or low mutterings. Unusual
circumstances surround them.

Most of the women are within doors; a few of the poorer class--of pure
Indian race--are seated in the piazza. They are hucksters, and their
wares are spread before them on a thin palm-leaf mat (_petate_), while
another similar one, supported umbrella-like on a stem, screens them and
their merchandise from the sun. Their dyed woollen garments, their bare
heads, their coarse black hair, adorned with twists of scarlet worsted,
impart to them somewhat of a gipsy look. They appear as free of care as
the zingali themselves: they laugh, and chatter, and show their white
teeth all day long, asking each new-comer to purchase their fruits and
vegetables, their _pinole_, _atole_, and _agua dulce_. Their not
unmusical voices ring pleasantly upon the ear.

Now and then a young girl, with red _olla_ poised upon her crown, trips
lightly across the piazza in the direction of the well. Perhaps she is
a _poblana_--one of the belles of the village--in short-skirted,
bright-coloured petticoat, embroidered but sleeveless chemisette, with
small satin slippers upon her feet; head, shoulders, and bosom, shrouded
in the blue-grey _reboso_; arms and ankles bare. Several of these may
be seen passing to and fro. They appear less uneasy than the men; they
even smile at intervals, and reply to the rude badinage uttered in an
unknown tongue by the odd-looking strangers around the well. The
Mexican women are courageous as they are amiable. As a race, their
beauty is undeniable.

But who are these strangers? They do not belong to the place, that is
evident; and equally so that they are objects of t