angles by a beehive-like tower of observation. At the time of Squier's visit, in 1849, both the hill and fort were overgrown with trees, but now the walls are whitewashed and the sides of the hill are covered with sward. The opposite hills are also cleared of timber, and appear to be used for pasture. A small garrison is maintained in the fort, which is also a place of confinement for political prisoners and criminals. A salute was fired from the fort at our approach. The English, under the great Nelson, captured this fort, after a stubborn resistance, in 1780. He reduced it by taking possession of a commanding hill in the rear.

The village is built upon a narrow shelf between the foot of the hill and the river. It is a collection of wretched wooden shanties, the only decent buildings being the storehouses and offices of the steamboat company. There is only one street, running through which is a tramway, used for transferring freight above the rapids. The custom house of Nicaragua for the San Juan River is located here, and the officials showed a very evident disposition to collect duty on our supplies, but by an exces

sive expenditure of Spanish were persuaded to desist. At the upper end of the village we found a little steamer, the Norma, to take us up the Toro Rapids, which are about fifteen miles long. It was so small that it could not carry more than half of the party, so some of us had to remain over night at Castillo. We found very good accommodations, however, in the company's buildings.

At Castillo the village priest, a fat, unctuous, and, as we soon discovered, exceedingly greedy mulatto, made himself, uninvited, a member of our party. The village fop attempted to do likewise, but was prevented by the officer in charge of the steamer, whereat he assumed the air of an injured grandee. The Toro Rapids extend from Castillo to the mouth of the Savallo River, about fifteen miles. The channel is very tortuous and the current in places so strong that the little Norma could scarcely make way against it. In these rapids we saw thousands of tarpon, the savalo-real of the natives. This fish has a way of rising to the surface and showing its dorsal fin after the manner of the porpoise. They are so abundant

that they frequently jump into the Norma, and a short time before our visit five were thus captured on one trip. They were all between five and six feet in length. Here also we saw an immense alligator, whose head alone was more than five feet long. When first noticed he had his head in a shallow place between two rocks, and his upper jaw raised at right angles to the lower jaw, so that it looked like a gnarled snag. The river men said that was his manner of fishing. Alligators are said to be very abundant in the river, but that was the first and only large one we saw. The snout is more pointed and otherwise differently shaped from that of the alligator found in the southern part of the United States.

The Savallo is a small river whose sources are in the Chontales Mountains, at a considerable distance from the San Juan. A short distance above its mouth there is a hot spring, the water of which is believed to possess excellent medicinal properties. About the sources of this river, which are difficult of access, gold in considerable quantities was said to have been discovered a short time before our arrival.

The

largest of the river steamers, the Managua, plies between the Savallo and San Carlos on the lake at the head of the San Juan, and makes the trip in less than six hours. The distance, is about thirty miles. Above the Savallo the San Juan is broad and deep and its current comparatively slow. The banks are low and frequently broken by lagoons. A palm, with great coarse leaves twenty feet in length, abundant in the delta, makes its reappearance here.

We reached San Carlos about six o'clock in the evening, in time to see the sun set on the lake, but of that hereafter. The village, named from the old Spanish fort that looks down on it, is on the north bank of the river, upon rolling ground, which terminates at the angle between the river and the lake in a high hill, upon whose crest stands the old fort. There is another high hill behind the town, so that altogether the situation is a striking one. The village is a heterogeneous collection of adobe structures, wooden buildings, lop-sided shanties and thatched huts. It contains several hundred inhabitants, and numerous goats. Half of the population was assembled about the

wharf-house to witness our arrival, which had been heralded by a salute of several guns from the fort. General Gutierres, the commandant of the post, came down to meet us, and invite us to inspect the fort. We accepted the invitation in a body, and he put his little garrison of twenty men through a dress parade for our benefit. Afterward he gave us some very good brandy. A fort which stood upon this site was captured by the English in 1665, and subsequently retaken by the Spaniards. Whether it was the existing fort, which undoubtedly is very old, is uncertain.