tral and South American cable, and the fact that a Pacific Mail steamer touches there twice a month. The foreign trade of Rivas, which is not very large, is done through San Juan del Sur. Rivas is situated upon a plain less than fifty feet above the level of Lake Nicaragua. It is almost due west of the southern extremity of the island of Ometepec and Medeira, about three and a half miles from the lake and twelve from the Pacific. The distance to San Juan del Sur, which is to the south, is about seventeen miles, and goods are transported between the two places entirely by carettas, for a part of the distance over wretched roads. The population of Rivas is estimated at 8,000, but the city is situated in the heart of the most densely populated rural district in Nicaragua, and it has besides several large Indian towns in its immediate neighborhood. Although the old chroniclers do not speak with particularity of the population of Rivas, or Nicaragua as it was then called, at the time of the conquest, there is a local tradition that it once contained about 1,000,000 inhabitants. The tradition, however, may refer to the district instead of the city

proper, as it does not seem likely that a city so large could have escaped specific mention in the chronicles of the Spaniards, especially after what we have seen they said about Managua. They distinctly state, however, that the country round about was densely populated, and existing conditions indicate that it must have been. No part of the Pacific coast of Nicaragua suffers so little from drought as this, and consequently, the soil is even more productive than that of other localities. There are many

fine cacao plantations throughout the district, and the cacao produced there is regarded as the best raised in the country.

Architecturally Rivas presents nothing of note. Like Chinandega it combines the Spanish and Indian types of building. Some of the most influential families of the country reside there, and it has the distinction of having furnished several of the presidents of the republic. It also has one sign of progress possessed by no other city in the country except Greytown a horse railroad, which connects it with San Jorge, its port on the lake, three and a half miles away. San Jorge is a thoroughly

Indian town in everything, except its storehouse on the shore of the lake, and its fine wooden pier, which extends several hundred feet into deep water.

The towns east of the lakes are mostly Indian in character, as the Spanish influence, except in the matter of religion, was less vigorously exerted there than in the country west of the lakes. The largest of them is Matagalpa, which contains about 10,000 inhabitants. Libertad, a place of 5,000 inhabitants, is the principal mining center of Chontales, and indeed of Nicaragua. There are many gold and silver mines in the neighborhood, worked chiefly by Englishmen and Frenchmen, and some of them have been very productive. Santo Domingo, with less than 1,000 inhabitants, about fifteen miles east of Libertad, is a distinctively mining town, and the only place of the kind in Nicaragua.

CHAPTER VII.

THE PEOPLE.

THE French enjoy the reputation of being the most polite people, but they are not more polite than the Nicaraguans. The speech of the common people abounds with compliments, invariably so neatly turned as to leave no room for doubt that they are the voice of nature and not of art. The peasant encountered on the road greets you with a pleasant salutation, while should you enter a house of high or low degree the owner thereof, in the customary phraseology of the country, at once proceeds to place it and everything pertaining to it at your disposal. And this is not mere affectation on the part of your host; it is the spontaneous expression of a nature both kindly and hospitable. In truth, the Nicaraguans are an urbane and amiable people. On the whole I was much more favorably impressed with the Indians and ladinos, or mes

tizos (mixed whites and Indians), than with the people of unalloyed Spanish descent. While, of course there are many admirable exceptions, the latter, as a rule, are much less industrious and amiable than the former.

But it is interesting to note how the conquering and conquered peoples have mutually influenced each other. The Spaniards, as their history conclusively proves, are naturally a cruel people, though courteous in manner and much given to polite forms of speech. The Indians, on the other hand, were pacific and kindly when the Spaniards found them. Now the Spaniards have thoroughly imbued the Indians with their good manners and flowery forms of speech, while the Indians have succeeded in softening and mellowing the Spanish nature. And yet it is impossible to recall the atrocities to which the Indians were for generations subjected without marveling that they did not imbibe the cruelty instead of the better qualities of their conquerors. That is a fact which must forever shed luster on the Indian name. It will not be forgotten either that the immanent dignity of the Indian saved him from becoming a slave.