It was about ten in the forenoon when I left Amatitlan. The road entered on a lonely range of hills. The soil was covered with stunted shrubs and a growth of long yellow grass. I could see the way for half a league before and behind; there was no one in sight. I rode leisurely along, looking down into a deep ravine on my right and thinking to myself, “That is an excellent place for robbers to lie in wait; I think I had better load my pistol”—which I had fired off just before reaching Tequila. Scarcely had this thought passed through my mind, when a little bush beside the road seemed to rise up; I turned suddenly, and, in a breath, the two barrels of a musket were before me, so near and surely aimed, that I could almost see the bullets at the bottom. The weapon was held by a ferocious looking native, dressed in a pink calico shirt and white pantaloons; on the other side of me stood a second, covering me with another double-barrelled musket, and a little in the rear appeared a third. I had walked like an unsuspecting mouse, into the very teeth of the trap laid for me.
“Down with your pistols!” cried the first, in a hurried whisper. So silently and suddenly had all this taken place, that I sat still a moment, hardly realizing my situation. “Down with your pistols and dismount!” was repeated, and this time the barrels came a little nearer my breast. Thus solicited, I threw down my single pistol—the more readily because it was harmless—and got off my horse. Having secured the pistol, the robbers went to the rear, never for a moment losing their aim. They then ordered me to lead my horse off the road, by a direction which they pointed out. We went down the side of the ravine for about a quarter of a mile to a patch of bushes and tall grass, out of view from the road, where they halted, one of them returning, apparently to keep watch. The others, deliberately levelling their pieces at me, commanded me to lie down on my face—“_la boca à tierra_!” I cannot say that I felt alarmed: it had always been a part of my belief that the shadow of Death falls before him—that the man doomed to die by violence feels the chill before the blow has been struck. As I never felt more positively alive than at that moment, I judged my time had not yet come. I pulled off my coat and vest, at their command, and threw them on the grass, saying: “Take what you want, but don’t detain me long.” The fellow in a pink calico shirt, who appeared to have some authority over the other two, picked up my coat, and, one after the other, turned all the pockets inside out. I felt a secret satisfaction at his blank look when he opened my purse and poured the few dollars it contained into a pouch he carried in his belt. “How is it,” said he, “that you have no more money?” “I don’t own much,” I answered, “but there is quite enough for you.” I had, in fact, barely sufficient in coin for a ride to Mexico, the most of my funds having been invested in a draft on that city. I believe I did not lose more than twenty-five dollars by this attack. “At least,” I said to the robbers, “you’ll not take the papers”—among which was my draft. “_No_,” he replied—“_no me valen nada_.” (They are worth nothing to me.)