The Churches And Their Altars Are Richly Adorned With All Requisites For Holy Worship; As Crosses, Candlesticks, Wax-Candles, Chalices, Cups, Plates, And Vessels For Incense, All Of Silver.

The ornaments of the altars and crosses are of velvet, and damask, and other rich materials, of various colours and splendid workmanship, adorned with embroidery of gold, silk and pearls.

Each town has its bells according to its ability. The chapels have choirs of good voices which sing in concert, tenors, trebles, and counter-tenors. In some places there are organs; but most have lutes, sackbuts, dulcimers, and bass and treble trumpets. This one province of Guatimala has more than my native county, old Castille. It is edifying and wonderful to see the devotion of the natives at the holy mass, especially when performed by the fathers of the orders of St Francis and of Mercy, who have the cures of the parishes. All the natives, men, women, and children, are taught the holy prayers in their own tongue; and always on passing a cross, crucifix, or altar, they fall on their knees repeating a _pater noster_ or an _ave Maria_. We, the conquerors, taught them to burn wax candles before the holy altars and crosses, and to behave respectfully to the reverend fathers, going out to meet them when they came to the towns, with lighted candles, ringing of bells, and providing them abundantly with provisions. On Lady Day and Corpus Christi, and other solemn fasts of the church, when we make processions, most of the natives of this city of Guatimala go likewise in procession, with crosses and lighted candles, bearing the images of their patron saints as richly dressed as they can afford, and singing litanies and other holy prayers to the sound of flutes and trumpets.

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