on the northern slope at the same height. Bananas are to be found at an elevation of 9,000 feet, three times the height at which they ceased on the eastern slope, as we came up from Vera Cruz. This difference between the two slopes depends, in part, on the different quantity of sunshine they receive, which is of some importance, although we are within the tropics. But the sheltering of the southern sides from the chilling winds from the north still further contributes to give their vegetation a really tropical character.
We felt the heat becoming more and more intense as we descended, and when we reached Cuernavaca we lay down in the beautiful garden of the inn, among orange-trees and cocoanut-palms, listening to the pleasant cool sound of running water, and looking down into the great barranca with its perpendicular walls of rock, and the luxuriant vegetation of the tierra caliente covering the banks of the stream that flowed far below us. We could easily shout to the people on the other edge of the ravine, but it would have taken hours of toiling down the steep paths and up again before we could have reached them.