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The sala was on the second floor; the musicians sat on the corridor beyond the open windows and scraped their fiddles and twanged their guitars, awaiting the coming of the American officers. Before long the regular tramp of many feet turning from Alvarado Street up the little Primera del Este, facing Mr. Larkin's house, made dark eyes flash, lace and silken gowns flutter.

En Quatro decadas desde el año de 1492 hasta el de 1554. Decada primera del rey Nuro Señor. MCMASTER, JOHN B. History of the United States. Six volumes. RHODES, J.F. History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 to the Final Restoration of Home Rule in the South. VON HOLST, HERMAN. The Constitutional and Political History of the United States of America.

To myself it happened that, passing along the streets in company with a friar that came with me the year before from Spain, a gentlewoman of great birth, knowing us to be new-comers, from her window called unto us, and, after two or three slight questions concerning Spain, asked us if we would come in and play with her a game at primera.

In the afternoon, the priest, the judge of primera instancia and myself took a coach to ride out to a neighboring hacienda, where there was a great sugar-mill, Louis accompanying us on horseback. Our road ran alongside the ridge and consisted of red limestone-clay. It was fairly good, though dry and dusty, and closely bordered with the usual Yucatecan scrub.

It was useless to urge effort, and we spent the time talking with the old judge in regard to the habits and superstitions of the indians and in walking with the judge of primera instancia up to the ridge which overlooked the town, and which was crowned by a little hermita. The population of Yucatan is still, for the most part, pure indian of Maya blood and speech.

"To the by-word touching the beauty of the women I must add the liberty they enjoy for gaming, which is such that the day and night is too short for them to end a primera when once it is begun; nay, gaming is so common to them, that they invite gentlemen to their houses for no other end.

May thy name be abhorred For thy conduct to ladies, From London to England, From Seville to Cadiz; May thy cards be unlucky, Thy hands contain ne'er a King, seven, or ace When thou playest primera; When thy corns are cut May it be to the quick; When thy grinders are drawn May the roots of them stick. Bireno, AEneas, what worse shall I call thee? Barabbas go with thee! All evil befall thee!

In the archives of Simancas is a duplicate copy of the first memorial, Relacion Primera, though, like the one in the Escurial, without its author's name. Munoz assigns it to the pen of Gabriel de Rojas, a distinguished cavalier of the Conquest.

We bivouacked at the foot of the "primera linea," or the first line of the partition of waters. The streams, however, on the east side do not flow to the Atlantic, but into an elevated district, in the middle of which there is a large saline, or salt lake; thus forming a little Caspian Sea at the height, perhaps, of ten thousand feet.

In cases of heinous or capital offences, the alcalde has simply an examining power, the testimony being taken down in writing, and transmit-to the juez de primera instancia, or first judge of the district, before whom the case is tried.