life of Santo Domingo.  Of the figures in the church, two are fairly good; one, which is famous, represents Our Lady of the Rosary.  In a little chapel are buried the remains of the old friars; here also is a beautiful old carved confessional.  In front of the old church is a great court surrounded by a stone wall, which is surmounted here and there with little, pointed, square pillars.  To the right of the church is a mass of masonry, in reddish-brown freestone, consisting of a series of arches, now more or less in ruins.  When the convent was at the height of its splendor, the crowd of worshippers was too large for the church itself, and these beautiful arches were erected to receive the overflow.  In the church itself, the plaster in the domes of the towers and the coloring on the walls and domes had chipped and fallen, on account of the earthquake, the day before.  In the ruins of the upper rooms of the convent proper, stone and mortar, dislodged from the decaying walls by the same shocks, lay in little heaps on the floor.

The cura had ten churches in his charge.  He says there are 2,000 people in Teposcolula, few of whom are indians.  In his ten churches, he has 12,000 parishioners.  He seemed a devout man, and emphasized the importance of his preaching to his congregation in their native tongue and his.  So convinced is he that the native idiom of the people is the shortest road to their heart and understanding, that he has prepared a catechism and Christian doctrine in the modern Mixtec, which has been printed.  The town itself is desolate; the plaza is much too large, and dwarfs the buildings which surround it, and signs of desolation and decay mark everything.  With the fondness which Mexicans show for high-sounding and pious inscriptions, the municipality has painted, upon the side of the town-house, in full sight for a long distance, the words, “Nations to be great and free must be educated.”  From here to Nochixtlan there was nothing of special interest.  For some four leagues the road was through a gorge; from this valley we mounted to the height, just before reaching the town of Tiltepec, from which we caught an extensive view down over the great valley in which Nochixtlan and this town lie.  From Tiltepec we had a rather tiresome, hot, and painful ride, passing San Juan Tillo and Santiago Tillo.  By half past one we were again in the city of Nochixtlan.

[Illustration:  TRIQUI CHILDREN; CHICAHUASTLA]

[Illustration:  MIXTEC POTTER; CUQUILA]

CHAPTER XII

THE MIXES REVISITED

(1899)

After resting at Oaxaca, from our trip into the high Mixteca, we made preparations for our new journey, leaving at three o’clock in the afternoon for the land of the Zapotecs and Mixes.  Our late start compelled stopping at Tule for the night.  In the morning we went on to Tlacolula, where we nooned, in order to see the jefe in regard to our work.  He is a competent man, showed great interest in our plan, and gave valuable advice, in addition to the orders to his officials.  He warned us that we might meet some difficulty at Milta, where we were planning to make our study of the Zapotecs, on account of the fiesta then in progress.  He told us to notify him at once in case matters did not go well there.