still further reduced by the compulsory cession to the United States of New Mexico (including Arizona) and Upper California. In 1863 the French invaded Mexico and took the capital, and from 1864 to 1867 Maximilian of Austria was upheld as Emperor of Mexico under the patronage of the French. But in the latter year the emperor was assassinated and the republican constitution

restored.

CENTRAL AMERICA.

Under this name are included the territory to the south of Mexico occupied by five independent republics, the territory in the south-east of Yucatan known as British Honduras, and the Isthmus of Panama, which belongs politically to the United States of Colombia and will be noticed in the section devoted to that federation. The names, area, population, &c., of the remaining parts of Central America are given in the following table:

The surface of Central America is diversified by three groups of highlands, a northern group occupying Guatemala, San Salvador, and the western portion of Honduras, a middle group occupying the greater part of Honduras and the whole of Nicaragua, and a southern group occupying Costa Rica and continued thence into the Isthmus of Panama. In the northern group a range of mountains of considerable height runs parallel to the west coast, while in the east a series of ranges traverses different plateaux which gradually sink down to the plains of Honduras. The separation between the northern and middle group is formed by a relative depression, varying from about five to fifteen miles in breadth, stretching north and south right across the land from ocean to ocean between the mouth of the Humuya and the Gulf of Fonseca. Right in the middle of this depression or plain stands the town of Comayagua, from which the plain takes its name. The second highland region is far from having been thoroughly explored, but appears to be mountainous only in the north-west (in Honduras), while in the south-east (in Nicaragua) the surface seems to present only a series of plateaux. The third highland region is separated from the middle one by the Lake of Nicaragua and the valley of the San Juan, which together form a still deeper depression than that which divides the first two.

This region, like the middle one, consists chiefly of elevated plateaux, and it embraces in the south the whole of Veragua belonging to the Isthmus of Panama. The whole region is traversed by a high mountain range.

elevation of the mountain ranges of Central America is about 6500 feet, but at some parts they rise to a height about one-half greater. As in Mexico, however, the highest summits are active volcanoes, which in Costa Rica rise from the plateaux, in Nicaragua and Salvador from the plains on the west coast, and in Guatemala (where they are more thickly crowded together than in any other part of the world except Java) from the very edge of the main mountain chain. Several of these volcanoes exceed 13,000 feet in height, and the Volcan de Agua near the town of Guatemala almost reaches the height of 14,500 feet. The rivers of Central America are numerous. Those on the west coast are generally extremely short and not navigable, but those on the east side are of greater consequence, and though they are in fact little used, might afford excellent means of communication. The principal lake is the Lake of Nicaragua.

Throughout Central America the rainfall is abundant, but as in other tropical countries a rainy alternates with a dry season, the former generally lasting from June to December. As in Mexico the distinction between these two seasons is sharper on the west coast than on the east, and sharper on the plateaux than either. In the south the rains are heavier and extend over a longer period than in the north, and on the north-east coast of Costa Rica one can scarcely speak of a dry season at all. As to temperature there is the same division into hot, temperate, and cold zones according to elevation as in Mexico; only in Central America the warmer zones rise higher. The hot zone, where tropical products can be cultivated in plantations, rises in the latter region to upwards of 3000 feet, while the temperate zone, in which forests gradually give place to savannahs, attains the height of nearly 6000 feet. Here the chief product is coffee, in the lower parts sugar, and the chief cereal maize. Still higher up wheat and other European products are grown.

Corresponding with the superior humidity of the east coast there is a much more vigorous development of vegetation on that side of Central America. The greater part of the surface is there covered with the most valuable timber and dye-woods,-mahogany, rose-wood, Brazil-wood, a kind of cedar, the silkcotton tree (Bombax), log-wood, &c. Palms are numerous, among them being the cabbage-palm (Oreodoxa oleracea) and the coco-nut palm, the latter being the most abundant of all. Besides timber and dye-woods the forests produce also drugs and spices, the most valuable of which are ipecacuanha, sarsaparilla, obtained from a climbing shrub, and vanilla, obtained from a climbing orchid. On the west side a long strip of coast in the north produces the so-called balsam of Peru, and is hence known as the Costa de Balsamo. In addition to food products, which are the same as in Mexico, the principal objects of cultivation in Central America are indigo, the best in the world, grown chiefly in San Salvador; cochineal, produced only in Guatemala, the southern republics having too moist a climate for its production; coffee, principally cultivated in Costa Rica and Guatemala; cacao, of excellent quality, grown along the whole of the

west coast; tobacco, not inferior to that of Cuba, grown most largely in Honduras, Guatemala, and San Salvador; sugar, the production of which, however, is on the decline. All these are articles of export, and besides these cotton is grown in Guatemala and other states, but not in sufficient quantity for export. Almost everywhere, but more especially in Honduras and Nicaragua, cattle-rearing is a more important occupation than agriculture in the narrower sense of the term.

As already mentioned in the general account of North America the fauna of Central America is on the whole more closely allied to that of the adjoining parts of South America than to that of the northern half of the New World; but while there are apes and other animals reminding us of South America, there are

also many pretty squirrels to remind us of North America. There are many amphibia in the region, among them the iguana and the bull-frog; in the marshy hollows alligators and large turtles are to be met with, and there are venomous as well as harmless serpents. But the most characteristic section of the fauna of Central America is that of the birds. For splendour of plumage the birds which swarm in the forests of this part of the world are nowhere surpassed. Parrots and pigeons are there in great variety, and also peacocks, curassows, toucans, and humming-birds, but the most splendid of all are the various species of trogon, and more particularly the quetzal or curucui, a bird from the feathers of which the ancient Mexicans used to weave pictures like those executed in Gobelin tapestry. Its wings and back are of a splendid cmerald green, in some lights with a blue gloss, in others with a shimmer of gold, its belly fire-red, and it has tail feathers a yard long. In the towns the Californian vulture (Cathartes) is just as necessary as a scavenger as the adjutant crane is in some parts of India. The whole region is infested by insect vermin, among which are a species of locust which sometimes commits dreadful ravages, and the kind of flea called nigua or chigoe, which often causes great pain by burrowing under the skin of the toes and laying its eggs there.

The minerals of the region include gold and silver in tolerable quantity, and

the former is mined in the eastern parts of Honduras and Nicaragua, the latter in Nicaragua and San Salvador. Lead, iron, and copper also exist, and coal, apparently of tertiary origin, is found in many parts. Mineral oils have been discovered in Guatemala on the banks of Lakes Vincente and Lampara. In general mining has but little attention paid to it.

The commerce of Central America is mainly carried on with the United States and Great Britain. The only good harbour on the Atlantic coast is that of Belize in British Honduras. That of Greytown or San Juan del Norte is so silted up that it can now admit only vessels of small size. The northern part of the Pacific coast is equally ill furnished with harbours and is besides exposed to a violent surf, but there are many good harbours in the Gulf of Fonseca and the parts of the coast stretching further southwards. No railway yet exists across that part of Central America occupied by the five republics, but one intended to cross Costa Rica has been measured, and others have been proposed. The depression of the San Juan River and Lake Nicaragua was one of the localities recommended for the interoceanic canal by which it is now proposed to connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in this part of the world, and was strongly advocated by some on account of the lowness of the land here. Throughout Central America the system of money, weights, and measures is generally the same as that in use in Mexico, but in San Salvador the peso or piastre of the approximate value of 4s. 3d. is used as well as the dollar of the approximate value of 4s.

The population of Central America is most thickly congregated in the west. It is composed of whites, Indians, people of mixed white and Indian race, and Negroes. In the republics the whites are almost without exception Spanish Creoles; but those of pure blood are not numerous, forming at most a twentieth of the whole population. Nevertheless they are still everywhere dominant. The Indians of pure blood form more than half of the population, and another large section consists of Indians of mixed race (ladinos), who in some parts regard themselves as Creoles. The Indians mostly belong to one stem, and speak dialects of the Maya language. The Negroes, who are all free, are not

numerous.

Central America was subjugated by Pedro de Alvaredo, a general acting under Cortez, in 1524. The conquerors found the eastern parts of the region inhabited only by rude hunting tribes, while in the west there dwelt much more highly civilized tribes, the Quiches in Guatemala having attained a stage of civilization almost as high as that of the Aztecs in Mexico. These tribes, however, were not united as in Mexico in one powerful kingdom, and were accordingly unable to offer any strong resistance to the invaders. Nowhere, in fact, did the natives submit more easily to the Spanish yoke, or adopt the religion of the conquerors (which was preached here by the noble-minded Las Casas) with greater readiness. While the connection with Spain subsisted the government of the Central American provinces was organized in much the same way as in Mexico. All the provinces were subject to the audiencia or supreme tribunal of Guatemala, and to one captain-general, but there was also

a separate governor for each of the five provinces. The provinces broke away from Spain in 1821, and from 1823 to 1839 they formed a confederation under the name of the United States of Central America, but since the latter year they have existed as independent republics. Since the separation from Spain the provinces have retrograded in many ways. The old Spanish aristocracy has been annihilated, and the government has for the most part got into the hands of members of the military profession, who carry it on with despotic caprice, or into those of a sort of plutocracy. The church has been deprived of its

influence and impoverished in every state except San Salvador, and in this one state in which the clergy still retain a great amount of influence that influence is said to be nearly all for bad.

GUATEMALA, the northernmost of the Central American states, has an area about equal to that of Pennsylvania, or more than half that of Great Britain. The northern portion of it from the Rio de la Pasion is almost entirely unknown, but so far as it is known the state contains very little low-lying land. On the table-lands the climate is mild, and said greatly to resemble that of Valencia in Spain. Of the exports of the state by far the most important is coffee, which is cultivated from an elevation of about 2600 to about 5000 feet. Next in value, though at an immense distance, are cochineal, hides, and sugar. Indigo and cacao are also grown, and caoutchouc is obtained. The commerce of Punta Arenas, the port of San José on the Pacific coast, is constantly increasing, steamers of the