having
never seen a Moor, and not being very familiar with Moorish costume,
had taken our blouzes for such. The strange guise in which we appeared
to them alleviated somewhat the mortification of not being recognised
by the fair lady of Merida.

Our road lay for some distance along the sierra. It was broad, open,
and the sun beat fiercely upon us. At half past ten we reached Akil,
and rode up to the casa real. At the door was a stone hollowed out like
those often before referred to, called pilas. In the steps and
foundation were sculptured stones from ruined mounds in the immediate
neighbourhood, and the road along the yard of the church ran through a
mound, leaving part on each side, and the excavated mass forming on one
side the wall of the convent yard. The rest of the wall, the church,
and the convent were built with stones from the ancient buildings. We
were on the site of another ruined city, of which we had never heard,
and might never have known, but for the telltale memorials at the door
of the casa real.

At a quarter before three we resumed our journey. The sun was still
very hot; the road was straight, stony, and uninteresting, a great part
of the way through overgrown milpas. At half past five we reached Mani,
again finding over the door and along the sides of the casa real
sculptured stones, some of them of new and curious designs; in one
compartment was a seated figure, with what might seem a crown and
sceptre, and the figures of the sun and moon on either side of his
head, curious and interesting in themselves, independent of the
admonition that we were again on the site of an aboriginal city.

In all our journey through this country there were no associations. Day
after day we rode into places unknown beyond the boundaries of Yucatan,
with no history attached to them, and touching no chord of feeling.
Mani, however, rises above the rest, and, compared with the profound
obscurity or the dim twilight in which other places are enveloped, its
history is plainly written.

When the haughty caciques of Maya rebelled against the supreme lord,
and destroyed the city of Mayapan, the reigning monarch was left with
only the territory of Mani, the people of which had not joined in the
rebellion. Here, reduced in power to the level of the other caciques,
the race of the ancient lords of Maya ruled undisturbed until the time
of the Spanish invasion; but the shadow of the throne rested over it;
it was consecrated