The Republican journal., 1896-09-17

has SO beautifully provided. Nowhere
exist greater inducements to labor: no.
where can SO much be produced with so
little etfort-yet nowhere in the world is
less actual work accomplished. The vast
resources of the country present the most
tempting opportunity for capital and en-
terprise, as nearly every acre of Honduras
is susceptible of some profitable develop
ment either mineral or agricultural.
Every part of the country contains more
or less mineral wealth, and the depart
ment of Comayagna, though not ranking
SO high as some, is abundantly favored
The neighboring village of Opoteca is
literally built upon a silver mine,
which was extensively worked under
the crown and with signal success. In
the hills of Lauterique and near the
villages of Las Piedras and Aramacina
are many silver mines now entirely aban-
doned OF at best but imperfectly worked
| They need the touch OF intelligence, en-
terprse and capital to become of value
{
tempt has ever been made to reduce
them; and throughout the department
are beds OF marble-blue. milky white,
veined. and sometimes cream color verg-
ing on orange. The present President Of
Honduras seems to possess broader views
than his predecessors, and is offering in
ducements before unheard OF to foreign
capital and immigration. To all Amer-
cans who have desired to establish bust
ness in the country he has given liberal
concessions and his great and laudable
ambition is to induce somebody to finish
the interoceanic railway, which was be-
gun and abandoned nearly 80 years ago,
leaving the country with only ~ miles of
poorly constructed road and an enormous
has never been paid. Until that is COM
| pleted Comayagua, in the heart of a road
less country must remain as isolated
from the world of commerce as an island
in the far Pacific.
The plain into which this mountain
valley opens stretches treeless for many
miles, and the character of it's surface
seems to show that it was once the
bottom of a great lake Now its glar-
ing sand and round white pebbles make
! it an inferno OF burning heat upon
which the sun beats its fiercest rays I'M
hindered by the friendly shadow of rock
OF tree. We rode out upon it a few miles to
investigate some prehistoric ruins; and
never was dIearier jaunt than that, I'M
| der blazing sky that nearly blinded US,
| through heavy sand and jointed cact of a
sickly light green color which twists and
| spyawls itself around like Dores' serpents
/ Everywhere in Honduras one encounters
evidence Of aboriginal occupation, and the
names Of some Of the towns are hose they
! possessed before the conquest, more or
| less modified by the Spanish pronunciation
Of them-such as Guaiquero, Chapulista-
hua, AiuteriqUe, Cururu, Guasistagua,
and other iaw-dislocaters. Traces OF the
! prehistoric people ''Antiguos, the Span
land, call them, a'e scattered all over the
/ country: mounds, like those Of Guatemala
and Mexico, telIaeed and truncated pyra-
mids the fallen walls Of temples and for
tihcations, broken pottery, obsidian knives
and deep wells dug into the solid rock
! Professor Squier explored some 800 OF
| these structures Of various sizes, from 20
/ feet square to 50 feet broad by 500 feet
| long, pyramidal, conical, terraced, On
merely enormous walls OF cut, carved and
polished stones. Many priceless speci-
mems taken from them adorn the Smith
sOnian Museum at Washington, the Brit
] ish Museum and other collections OF an
tiquitjes, but only one solitary sample can
be seen at Comayagua-and that is q dog
| shaped figure, taken from some nearby
ruin and built into the walls of the Church
OF Our Lady of Dolores.
Returning across the desert we met a
funeral going out on foot to the shabby
! little burial enclosure mile beyond the
town. The coffin, a wooden box, painted
blue, was borne on the shoulders of four
/ men III 'front.' OF II marched the priest
in black robes and shovel hat, preceded
| by several boys who laboriously carried
and dragged along over the sand life
sized figure of the blessed Virgin; while
| behind came a molly multitude, male and
! female, young and old, all with faring
candles that burned yellow by ''the gar
ish light of day What blessing, in
this world of graves and sorrow, is re-
ligion, in any guise! No doubt that
| tawdry wooden image, with its sugges-
tions of divine grief and heavenly recon-
pense, brought to the fancy of those
humble mourners consolation vainly
sought by many who fancy themselves
more enlightened.
The constitution of this government is
said to be patterned after that of the
| United States, but it contains few
| original clauses that might we'll be ncor-
porated into the pattern. For example,
to be eligible to Congress, a candidate
must be not only a native of Central
| 4 lint Of Io