Читать книгу Spanish America (Vol. 1&2) - C. Reginald Enock - Страница 11

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Of all the lands of the New World, none perhaps has impressed itself more on the imagination than the picturesque and enigmatical land of Mexico. It seems to stand, in our thoughts of distant countries, apart from all others, a riddle we cannot read, surrounded by a halo or mist of unreality, a region vague and shadowy as its Toltec ancestors.

Perhaps this view has in part arisen from the description of the Conquest by famous writers, which so greatly interested our forbears of the Victorian period, and by the romantic story-writers of the same era. But these matters alone would not account for the hazy atmosphere surrounding the old land of the Aztecs, which even the prosaic matters of trade and finance do not seem to lift. There are many English and American folk with commercial interests in Mexico, who draw perhaps, or in happier times there have drawn, dividends from their investment in mine, or railway, or other enterprise; but even this material standpoint fades into intangibility before the endeavour to form a true mental image of the land.

Who are the Mexicans, where does their country lie, what language do they speak, what dress do they wear? Geography and ethnology will furnish us with the most exact replies; the books of travellers will fill in abundant detail, but nevertheless, Mexico remains for us an enigma.

We shall not hope here successfully to dispel this mystery, even though we may have been there, traversed its varied surface, and lived among its people. To say that Mexico is the Egypt of the New World, whilst it is not untrue, is to deepen the atmosphere. The sandalled Indian creeps across his desert sands and irrigates them with his native torrents as he did in centuries past, lives in his wattle or adobe hut, and, if he no longer worships the sun, at least he stands before its morning rays to embrace its warmth—el capa de los pobres ("the poor man's cloak")—for poverty denies him other comfort. The rich man is clothed in fine textures of European model and may dwell in a palace, but beneath his modernized exterior are traits of the Orient, and the blood of the Moor, the Goth, the Vandal, the Roman, the Celt, the Semite, brought hither in the Spaniard, is mingled with that of the Aztec, who lived upon the great plateau and built his temples of strange and bloody worship.

No other American nation constitutes so wide a blending of original races. Spain itself was a veritable crucible of languages, peoples and creeds, whilst aboriginal Mexico contained a large number of tribes, each with their particular culture, or lack of such.[7] For Mexico, it is to be recollected, was not a land like the United States or Canada, which contained, relatively, but a few bands of Indians, without any particular form of government or developed institutions.

The grandees of Spain came out to rule this diversified land, and they did not disdain to make it their home. Spain gave it of her best often, with capable legislators, laws; the Ley de Indias, enacted for the benefit of the colonies, and erudite professors and devout—over-devout—ecclesiastics; and these often carried out their work with patriotism and fervency. Although it is not yet, the student of history will be fain to think that out of this seed a good growth must in the future come to being, and this we may say without any unnecessary apologetics for Mexico.

But what, we may ask, is the influence here, that throws back this fruitful land from time to time to anarchy, and makes its name a byword?

Disorder and treachery periodically arises, dictator succeeds dictator, revolution follows revolution, and the country's soil, whether in the streets of its capital, whether upon its desert plains or in its tropic valleys, is drenched with the blood of its own sons. The results of thirty years of a constructive national policy which Diaz gave, the hopes and pretensions of a high civilization, laboriously built up, sink down to nought, revert to the conditions of that dreadful half-century that followed upon Independence, from which stand forth the names—noble and ignoble—of Iturbide, Maximilian, Juarez, or Morelos. What ails this strange land? Is it capable of no better life?

In reply, Mexico is a land following the inevitable law of reaping what it has sown, and both the sowing and the reaping are but exaggerated forms of processes that are affecting the world at large. Judgment must not be too heavily passed upon Mexico as a whole, for, as I shall later show, a whole nation must not be condemned by reason of some of its nationals.

Mexico, like all Spanish American States, is at the mercy, politically and economically, of certain small sections of the people. Government is of an oligarchy in normal times, which often abuses its position. The bulk of the people have neither art nor part in their own governance. The ballot box is too often a delusion and a snare. A turbulent or ambitious element can seize power at any moment by a golpe de estado (a coup d'état). The upper and refined class, which, be it said, is the equivalent of and as well-informed often as that in Europe, stand aloof from political revolution and disturbance, and would be the last to commit the excesses which bring execration upon the country's name. The educated Mexican has all the traditions of the caballero, the gentleman; the Mexican lady is refined, devout, delicate and tenderhearted. The peon and the Indian are not turbulent, but well-meaning and generally industrious.

These matters we shall further consider; for the moment let us pass on to survey the land itself, to traverse its wide and diversified surface, with its many elements of beauty, interest and utility.

Here, then, is a land of vast extent, in which various European countries could be contained; stretching from the borders of Central America northward to those of the United States, two thousand miles long upon its major axis, shaped upon the map like a cornucopia, washed on one side by the Atlantic, on the other by the Pacific, and containing within itself every resource of Nature which could make for plenty and progress. Its southern half lies within the Tropics, but consisting in great part of an elevated tableland, where the diurnal range of temperature—from the heat of the day to the cold of the night—is so considerable that latitude we find is not a reliable guide to climate.

This great plateau, whose escarpments, viewed as we approach from either side present the appearance of mountains, is in large part sterile, treeless, and without rivers of importance or navigability. But it is crossed by ranges of steely-blue hills and intersected by fertile valleys, where agriculture is carried on under irrigation—an ancient art by means of canals fed from the intermittent streams. Cacti, strange and gaunt, clothe it by nature, but there are large coniferous forests upon the mountain slopes in places.

Do we approach the country from the north, by the railway lines from the United States border, we traverse deserts among the most dreadful of the New World, deserts yet with a certain cruel beauty of their own, where once the Apache roamed—cruellest and most horrible of all the world's savage folk.

But Nature has disposed along this high plateau, vast, fabulously vast mineral wealth, and from the famous mines of Guanajuato, Zacatecas, Chihuahua, Durango, Potosi, Aguascalientes, Pachuca; and places—some of them noble towns, dowered with royal charters before the Mayflower sailed for New England—silver and gold poured forth to fill the needy coffers of Spain. Later, the English shareholder tried his hands upon the "mother-lode" with varying fortune, and copper, iron and other metals also came like magic from the rocks of this great wilderness.

On the eastern and western versants of the country, and in the south, we encounter a different landscape. Here Nature smiles. In places it may be hot and humid, perhaps malarious, with tangled forests. But rich vegetation, gorgeous flora and profuse animal life—bird, insect, reptile—abound. Here are fruitful plains and valleys, vast sugar-cane plantations, luscious fruits of kinds unknown to the world outside—among them the mamey, the "fruit of the Aztec kings," with orange and banana groves, coffee gardens, cocoa-trees, yielding the chocolatl of the Aztecs, rubber-trees with elegant foliage, whilst above, the graceful coco-palm rears its stately column and feathery plume high against the azure sky.

SCENE ON THE GREAT PLATEAU, MEXICO.

Vol. I. To face p. 104.

Here, indeed, is a region where it might have been supposed that man could dwell in peace and plenty, with a minimum of toil and ambition, of care and evil.

The climatic zones of Mexico were named by the Spaniards in accordance with the condition of their varying temperatures respectively, as, the Tierra Caliente, or hot lands, the Tierra Templada, or temperate lands, and the Tierra Fria, or cold lands: the first lying upon the coast, the second midway up the slopes, and the last the higher regions, reaching an elevation of 8,000 to 10,000 feet and more above the level of the sea.

In this intermediate zone of the Tierra Templada lies a land which has been not unjustly termed a region of perpetual spring, a truly desirable land, where the fortunate inhabitant lives close to the kindly earth as if in some mortal paradise—as far as Nature is concerned. In the high zone, healthful and invigorating, lies the beautiful city of Mexico in its enclosed valley; and many a handsome town is found throughout the three zones.

This city of Mexico was the coveted prize of Cortes and his Spaniards, and through the varying zones they passed after having, on that Good Friday in 1519, landed on the shores to which they gave the name of Vera Cruz—the place of the True Cross. Across the waters of the Gulf as they approached the unknown land was seen the gleaming peak of Orizaba, called by the natives Citlalteptl, or the Mountain of the Star, hanging in mid-heaven, its point over thirteen thousand feet above the sea.

From the shore, the native runners of Montezuma bore swiftly upwards to the mountain city news of the white man's arrival—long expected of old, from the traditions of Quetzalcoatl, the mystic god-man of white race. These messengers made curious but faithful "picture-writings," on Mexican paper, of the great "water-houses" or caravels swinging in the bay, the dread "men-animals" or horsemen, and the thunderous guns of the Spaniards, and hastened thence to warn their master.

Swiftly they returned from the mountains. "Go back," the Aztec Emperor said, "come not hither, the road is long and difficult," and he sent presents—a huge wheel of gold and beautiful feather work and other objects.

But Cortes, heeding not the message, burned his boats; the customary Mass was rendered by the Padre Olmedo—the Spaniards were always devout, partly in sincerity, partly as a custom—and the adventurers set forth on that remarkable and adventurous journey which forms one of the most thrilling episodes in early American history. Let us briefly review it.

The Spaniards have allied themselves, in the fruitful land of Tlascala—the "Land of Bread" in the native tongue—with the Tlascalans, foes at first but friends afterwards, and then began the most stirring events of their march.

"The Tlascalans were a people who had developed a remarkable civilization and social and military organization, akin to that of the Aztecs. On the arrival of the messengers of Cortes much dissension had prevailed in their councils, some of the chiefs—the community was ruled by a council of four—maintaining that this was an opportunity for vengeance against their hereditary enemies, the hated Aztecs and their prince, Montezuma. 'Let us ally ourselves with these terrible strangers,' they urged, 'and march against the Mexicans.' For the doings of the Spaniards had echoed through the land already, with a tale of smitten tribes and broken idols. But the wily old Xicotencatl thought otherwise. 'What do we know of their purpose?' was his counsel; so it was agreed that the army of the Tlascalans and Otomies, who were in force near the frontier, under the command of the fiery young warrior—son of old Xicotencatl, and bearing the same name—should attack them. 'If we fail,' the old barbarian urged, 'we will disavow the act of our general; if we win——'!

"The stone fortification at the valley's end had been undefended, and with Cortes at their head the Spaniards entered Tlascalan territory. Skirmishing was followed by a pitched battle between the Christians and the Tlascalans, in which the firearms and lances of the Spaniards wrought terrible havoc on their antagonists. Astounded at the sight of the horses—those extraordinary beings, whether of animal or demoniacal origin they knew not—and appalled by the thundering of the guns, which seemed to have some superhuman source, the Tlascalans at first fell back. But they overcame their fears, fell savagely upon the invaders, and were with difficulty repulsed, having managed to kill two of the horses. Greatly to Cortes's regret was this, for the noble animals were few, and—more serious still—their death removed that semi-superstitious dread regarding them, which the natives held. However, the Spaniards afterwards buried them from sight.

"Night fell, a season when the Indians fought not, but on the morrow the messengers which had been sent to the Tlascalans arrived—having escaped—with the news that the enemy was approaching in great force. So indeed it befel, and upon the plain in front of the Spaniards appeared a mighty host, varyingly estimated between thirty and a hundred thousand warriors. The Spaniards with their allies numbered—fearful odds!—about three thousand. 'The God of the Christians will bear us through,' said the brave and beautiful Marina. A frightful battle now ensued, the issue of which hung in the scale for hours. Charging, volleying, borne this way and that by the flood of the enemy's numbers, the gallant band of the Spaniards snatched victory from almost certain defeat, their superior weapons and cavalry, together with the bad tactics of the Indians, who knew not how to employ their unwieldy army to best advantage, at length decided the day for the Christians, who inflicted terrible punishment upon their foes. The Tlascalans' policy now showed signs of weakening, but further assaults were necessary, and some treachery, under the guise of friendship, having been discovered on the part of the fifty Tlascalan envoys to the Spanish camp, Cortes barbarously cut off the hands of these and sent them back to tell the tale.

"The upshot of these engagements was that the Tlascalans capitulated, apologized for their conduct, invited the strangers to take possession of their capital, and assured them that they would now be allies, not enemies, of the white men, who were undoubtedly the representative of the great and long-expected Quetzalcoatl. The joy in the Spanish camp at this turn of affairs knew no bounds; well did the Spaniards know that the continued opposition of the Indians would have been their ruin, whilst in their alliance was salvation and the key to the Conquest.

"Behold the war-worn and hungry Spaniards, lean and tattered from marching and privations in the inclement uplands, now installed in comfort in the centre of the powerful Tlascalan capital. Forth had come to greet them young Xicotencatl, who, to do him justice, took upon himself the responsibility of the war; and as the Spaniards entered the capital the streets were lined with men, women and children, and decorated with garlands of flowers as for a triumphal procession. The old chief who had urged for opposition now changed his tactics, and as Cortes entered he embraced him, passing his hand over the face of the Spaniard to see what manner of man he was, for the aged Tlascalan was blind, having reached, it has been said—probably with exaggeration—a hundred and forty years of age! 'The city is much larger than Granada,' wrote Cortes to Carlos V, with a description of its markets, shops, houses and intelligent and industrious population.

"Six weeks the Spaniards sojourned there, recuperating their energies, living on the best the plentiful land afforded—Tlascala signified in the Indian tongue 'the land of bread'—taking wives from among the maidens, the chiefs' daughters, and endeavouring, first with the foolish haste of Cortes and then with the slow prudence of Father Olmedo, to instil some tenets of the Christian religion into their hosts. But religious fervour had to give way to material necessities, and the Tlascalan idols remained unsmitten, although their human sacrifices were somewhat stayed.

"Rested and mended, the Spaniards now set impatient gaze upon the oak- and fir-clad mountain slopes which bounded the valley. Above them loomed upward the great Malinche, snow-capped queen of the Tlascalan mountain fastnesses; and still the friendly Tlascalans, stern foes but noble allies, loaded them with every favour and bid them tarry. When, however, they would stay no longer they raised a great body of warriors to accompany them, warning Cortes against the wiles of Montezuma. 'Beware of his presents and his promises; he is false and seeks your destruction,' they urged, and their implacable hatred of the Aztecs showed itself in their words and mien.

"Contrary to the advice of their new allies, the Spaniards decided to journey on to Mexico through Cholula, the land of the great pyramid. Embassies had arrived, both from Montezuma and from the Cholulans, the latter inviting the Spaniards to go that way; and the great Aztec monarch, swayed now by the shadow of oncoming destiny, offering the Spaniards a welcome to his capital. 'Trust not the Tlascalans, those barbarous foes,' was the burden of his message, 'but come through friendly Cholula: a greeting received by the Tlascalans with sneers and counter-advice. The purpose of the Tlascalans was not a disinterested one. An attack upon Montezuma was their desire, and preliminary to this they hoped to embroil the Spaniards with the perfidious Cholulans. Another embassy—and this was an important event—had waited upon Cortes. It was from the Ixtlilxochitl, one of the rival claimants for the throne of Texcoco, which, it will be remembered, was a powerful and advanced community in confederation with the Aztecs; and Cortes was not slow to fan the flame of disaffection which this indicated, by an encouraging message to the young prince.

"A farewell was taken of the staunch Tlascalans, the invariable Mass was celebrated by Father Olmedo, and, accompanied by a large body of Tlascalan warriors, the Spaniards set out for Cholula. What befel in this beautiful and populous place—which, Bernal Diaz wrote, reminded him, form its numerous towers, of Valladolid—was of terrible and ruthless import. Cholula, with its great teocalli, was the Mecca of Anahuac, and was veritably a land flowing with milk and honey. Well-built houses, numerous teocallis, or pyramidal temples, well-dressed people with embroidered cloaks, and numbers of censer-swinging priests formed the ensemble which greeted the Spaniards' eyes, whilst the intense cultivation of the ground and the fields of maguey, maiz, and other products, irrigated by canals from the mountain streams, formed the environment of this advanced community. 'Not a palm's-breadth of land that is not cultivated,' wrote Cortes in his dispatches to Castile, 'and the city, as we approached, was more beautiful than the cities of Spain.' Beautiful and gay doubtless Cholula was when the Spaniards entered; drenched with the blood of its inhabitants and devastated by fire it lay before they left it! There had been signs of treachery, even on the road thither, work of the Cholulans; but, lodged in the city, the Spaniards discovered, through the agency of the intelligent Marina, a plot to annihilate them later. Taking the Cholulans unawares as they crowded the streets with—at the moment—harmless curiosity, the Spaniards, with cannon, musket and sabre, mowed down the unfortunate and unprotected natives in one bloody massacre, aided by the ferocious Tlascalans, who fell upon the Cholulans from the rear. The appalling and unnecessary slaughter at Cholula has called down upon the heads of Cortes and the Spaniards the execration of historians. Some have endeavoured to excuse or palliate it, but it remains as one of the indelible stains of the Spanish Conquistadores upon the history they were making. Having accomplished this 'punitive' act, an image of the Virgin was set up on the summit of the great pyramidal temple, and some order restored. 'They are now your Highness's faithful vassals,' wrote Cortes to the King of Spain!

"After this the way seemed clear. Far on the horizon loomed the white, snow-capped cones of Popocateptl and Ixtaccihuatl, beautiful and pure above the deserts, the canyons, and the forests beneath them—the gateway to Mexico. From the foremost, above its snow-cap, there belched forth a great column of smoke, for at that period Popocateptl was an active volcano. Onwards the Spaniards pressed with buoyant hearts and eager feet, and when they stood upon the summit of the range their eyes beheld the beautiful valley of Mexico, the haven for which they had long toiled and fought, stretched below. There, shimmering in distance, lay the strange, unknown city of the Aztecs, like a gem upon the borders of its lakes: its towers and buildings gleaming white in the brilliant sun of the tropic upland beneath the azure firmament and brought to deceptive nearness by the clear atmosphere of that high environment. There at last was their longed-for goal, the mysterious Tenochtitlan."[8]

The city of Mexico, notwithstanding its modern attributes, is stamped with history and tradition, and in this respect is perhaps the most noteworthy metropolis on the American continents. It is, as it were, a mediaeval city, transplanted from the Old World to the New. The United States has, naturally, no place which may compare with it, and in happier times Mexico City has been a tourist centre for Americans, who, escaping from the more materialistic and commercial atmosphere of their own busy towns, and the extremes of heat or cold which alternate therein, have sought the equable and healthful condition of the Mexican upland capital—an easy journey comparatively, of a few days in a Pullman car, amid landscapes attractive from their novelty.

We are in a city of churches and convents. Elsewhere I have described some of these remarkable edifices, home of the Roman Catholic faith, and as we view the city from the pleasing hills surrounding the valley their domes and towers stand up refreshingly.

The houses of Mexico are of a type unknown to the Anglo-Saxon American; the social customs, the aspects of the streets, the markets, the flower-market, the old, massive public buildings, the cotton-clad Indian folk in the plazas side by side with beautifully dressed señoritas and correctly attired, grave and ceremonious men—statesmen, lawyers, doctors and men of many professions, the serenatas or concerts in the alamedas, the lottery ticket vendors thrusting their flimsy wares into one's face, urging you to tempt fortune—for will not the wheel be turned in the public square in half an hour, and may you yourself not be the winner of the sorteo?—all these features catch the traveller's eye as in the genial sunshine, before the midday heat renders the shade of the patio or veranda advisable, we observe the life of the Mexican city. In the market-place, at an early hour or in the evening, the odour of the tortilla or the frijoles, fried in the open for ready sale, will greet our nostrils, and there are piquant chiles—a favourite article of diet—and many luscious and unknown fruits which we cannot resist.

THE CATHEDRAL, CITY OF MEXICO.

Vol. I. To face p. 114.

Under the shade trees in the plaza or the alameda, escorted by Indian maid-servant, or perhaps entering or leaving the temples, are sweet-faced girls of the upper class, pale oval-faced señoritas with dark hair and expressive eyes, with the mantilla drawn over the head, bent on their early-morning orisons: but though their thoughts are at the moment doubtless dwelling upon matters spiritual, there are glances from expressive eyes—

Para que te miré, mujer divina?

Para que contemplé tu faz hermosa?

Sentiment and love, indeed, play a strong part in the temperament of this southern race, with all its reserve and seclusion.

The foreigner in Mexico will thus find a varied local colour in the Mexican capital and in other cities throughout the Republic, such as could long occupy his pen, and indeed his brush, if he wield such. To come into actual touch with the people in their homes is more difficult, but if he is fortunate enough to be the guest in an upper class Mexican family, he will experience the most pleasing hospitality. To penetrate such circles, however, there must be the appropriate qualities and circumstances.

In this peaceful city there are few signs of revolution, disorder or bloodshed. The walls here and there may be pitted with bullet-marks, but the things which caused them come and go, and the populace lives its life with merely passing notice of them.

We may wander somewhat farther afield in the valley: to the suburbs where the palaces of the wealthy lie embowered in flowers and orange-trees; to Xochimilco, the Field of Flowers; to Chalpultepec—the Aztec "Hill of the Grasshoppers," where stands the presidential castle; to the shrine of Guadalupe, the Lourdes of Mexico, where the Virgin, it is said, appeared in a vision to Juan, the poor Indian.

The great lake of Texcoco, a dreary body of water now—it is partly drained by a great canal, to the far greater salubrity of the place—formerly extended to the city, which, indeed, at the time of the Conquest, was built upon it and reached by stone causeways—a position which might have been impregnable.

The first attempt by Cortes and the Spaniards upon Tenochtitlan ended in disaster. They were enjoying the Aztec hospitality, which, however, they outraged. They attacked and massacred a number of the people and took Montezuma a prisoner in the stout palace which had been assigned as their quarters. They stormed and carried the great Teocalli, or pyramid-temple, and threw down the great idol of the Mexicans. Montezuma was killed, either by a missile from without or treacherously by the Spaniards whilst in their power. All seemed lost as a result of the mad act of Alvarado in attacking the people. The story of the disaster is a thrilling one.

"The bridges broken, the savages screaming outside the walls, hope of victory gone, there was now no counsel of war for the Spaniards save that of escape. But how? At night and along the great causeway was the only plan. A weird scene it was on the beginning of that Noche Triste—the sorrowful night—which stands forth so unforgettably in the history of the Conquest. Disorder everywhere; piles of gold and valuables on the floor, each Spaniard, whether cavalier or boor, loading himself with what he thought he could carry. 'Pocket what you can,' Cortes said, 'but recollect that gold is heavy and we have to travel swiftly'—grave advice, the neglect of which cost some their lives upon that awful night.

"And then began the retreat along the fatal causeway. It was known that there were three openings in this, and a portable bridge had been made and was borne along to enable passage to be effected. Hurrying on in the hope of passing the breaches before alarm might be given, the Spaniards entered upon the causeway and placed their portable bridge upon the first breach. Was safety to be theirs? No! what was that appalling sound, sonorous and melancholy, which rang over the city and the waters amid the darkness? It was the great drum on the teocalli; the tambor of the war-god, sounded by vigilant priests, calling the people to vengeance and battle. And in their myriads the Aztecs poured forth and fell upon the Christians, raining darts and stones upon them, and making the night hideous with their war-cries. Meanwhile Cortes and the advance guard had passed over, and reached the second breach. 'Bring up the bridge!' was the repeated order, as those behind crowded on. Useless; the bridge was stuck fast in the first breach, wedged down by the weight of guns and horses which had passed over it, and as these dread tidings were heard the mass of men upon the narrow causeway lost their presence of mind. Those behind crowded on those in front; men and horses rolled into the lake; Spaniards and Tlascalans fell victims to the Aztecs, who crowded the water in their canoes and leapt upon the causeway; the shouts of vengeance and triumph of the savages resounded all along the dyke, silencing the muttered oath or prayer of the Christians huddled at the breach. Down went horse and man, artillery and treasure, until the bodies of Christians and Indians and horses, and bales of merchandise and chests of ammunition the breach was almost filled, and a portion of the fugitives passed over. And now the third breach yawns before them—deep and wide. The morning is dawning upon the fatal scene; the salt waters of the lake have closed over many a gallant Christian head; the frightful causeway is strewn with wreck of man and merchandise. 'The rear guard perishes!' and 'back and save them!' were the words which rang out then, and Cortes and his remaining cavaliers, who were in the lead, rode back, even in that frightful hour—be it recorded to their honour—and, swimming the breach once more, strove to support their comrades. There stood Alvarado unhorsed and battling, with the savages pressing upon his rear. Escape there seemed none. Canoes and spears teemed on every side, and Cortes and his companions were forced onward."[9]

The figure of Alvarado stood up against the grey sky alone—a moment—and then he measured the breach with his eye. Planting his lance on the wreckage in the waters of the breach, after the manner of a leaping-pole, the heroic Spaniard, collecting his energies, leapt forward, and passed the chasm at a bound. The Aztecs paused in admiration of this feat of the "Son of the Sun," as they had named Alvarado, from his fair hair and ruddy countenance. To-day we may still see the place where this part of the causeway lay, known as the Puente de Alvarado.

Away off the causeway into the grey dawn passed the remnant of the routed Spanish Army, wounded, bleeding, starving, their comrades gone, some to death, some to the dreadful sacrifices of the Mexican priests, where their hearts would be torn living from their breasts, and annihilation threatening all. Baggage and artillery were gone, not a carbine was left, and Cortes, seating himself upon the steps of a ruined temple on the shore, wept bitter tears of sorrow for the loss of his comrades and his vanished fortunes.

So ended the Noche Triste, and to this day may be seen an ancient tree under which it is said Cortes wept.

The Spaniards, however, were not of such stuff as easily gives in to difficulty and disaster. Had it been otherwise, Mexico to-day might have had a different destiny. It might have developed a purely aboriginal or Indian state. But fate seems not to have willed it that any such nation should exist in the New World.

Cortes and the remnant of his army—there was no other course for them—returned to their Tlascalan allies, fighting their way even here, however, for after passing the ancient pyramid of Teotihuacan, even then standing ruined and desolate a few miles north of the city—monument of the shadowy Toltecs, who preceded the Aztec hegemony, and which, restored by the Mexican Government under President Diaz, is an object of great interest to the traveller—they looked down on the Plain of Otumba, and beheld the forces of the Otomies drawn up in battle array against them. These warriors wore armour of thick quilted cotton, which formed a considerable protection against the rude weapons of the country, and the Spaniards were now without firearms. They were so numerous that, it is recorded, the plain "looked as if it were covered with snow," from the white armour.

But the Christians routed them, and thus the Battle of Otumba was one of the turning-points in New World history, as elsewhere remarked.

Reinforced by the Tlascalans, Cortes returned to the siege of the city. Fresh supplies of arms and ammunition had reached the Spaniards from the coast, with horses and two hundred Spaniards sent from Hispaniola. Cortes built a number of brigantines, which were carried by the Indians to the lake in order to attack Tenochtitlan by water as well as land. But the whole enterprise would have been hopeless had not the other Mexican tribes, hating the Aztecs, joined forces with the white men. The plan was to starve out the city on the lake by laying waste the surroundings, for it was dependent upon these for its food. To the dead Montezuma's place had succeeded his nephew Guahtemoc, a noble Aztec prince, animated by the utmost spirit of patriotism in defending the heritage of his forefathers.

"A series of severe struggles began then, both by land and water—burning, slaughter and the destruction of the lake towns. The Aztecs, with their great number, raining darts and stones upon the invaders at every engagement, attacked them with unparalleled ferocity both by forces on shore and their canoes on the lake. The Spaniards took heavy toll of the enemy at every turn, assisted by their allies the Tlascalans, as savage and implacable as the Aztecs, whom they attacked with a singular and persistent spirit of hatred, the result of long years of oppression by the dominant power of Anahuac. Cortes, on every occasion when it seemed that the last chance of success might attend it, offered terms to the Aztec capital, by no means dishonourable, assuring them their liberty and self-government in return for allegiance to the Crown of Spain and the renouncing of their abominable system of sacrificial religion. These advances were invariably met by the most implacable negatives. The Aztecs, far from offering to yield, swore they would sacrifice, when the day was theirs, every Spaniard and Tlascalan on the bloody altars of their gods; and as for entering into any treaty, the last man, woman and child would resist the hated invaders until the last drop of blood was shed and the last stone of their city thrown down. This vaunt, as regards the latter part, was almost literally carried out, and to some extent as regards the former.

"The siege operations were conducted vigorously both by land and water. Again before the eyes of the Spaniards stretched that fatal causeway—path of death amid the salt waters of Texcoco for so many of their brave comrades upon the Noche Triste of their terrible flight from Tenochtitlan. And there loomed once more that dreaded teocalli, whence the war-drum's mournful notes were heard. Guarded now by the capable and persistent Guatemoc, the city refused an offer of treaty, and invited the destruction which was to fall upon it. From the azoteas, or roofs of their buildings and temples, the undaunted Mexicans beheld the white-winged brigantines, armed with those belching engines of thunder and death whose sting they well knew: and saw the ruthless hand of devastation laying waste their fair towns of the lake shore, and cutting off their means of life.

"But the Spaniards had yet to learn to their cost the lengths of Aztec tenacity and ferocity. It will be recollected that the city was connected to the lake shores by means of four causeways, built above the surface of the water; engineering structures of stone and mortar and earth, which had from the first aroused the admiration of the Spaniards. These causeways, whilst they rendered the city almost impregnable from attack, were a source of weakness in the easy cutting-off of food supplies, which they afforded to the enemy. A simultaneous assault on all these approaches was organized by the Spaniards, under Sandoval, Alvarado and Cortes himself, respectively, whilst the brigantines, with their raking artillery, were to support the attack by water, aided by the canoes of the Tlascalan and Texcocan allies. A series of attacks was made by this method, and at last the various bodies of Spaniards advanced along the causeways and gained the city walls. But frightful disaster befel them. The comparative ease with which they entered the city aroused Cortes's suspicions; and at that moment, from the summit of the great teocalli, rang out a fearful note—the horn of Guatemoc, calling for vengeance and a concerted attack. The notes of the horn struck some ominous sense of chill in the Spaniards' breasts, and the soldier-penman, Bernal Diaz, who was fighting valiantly there, says that the noise echoed and re-echoed, and rang in his ears for days afterwards. The Spaniards, on this, as on other occasions, had foolishly neglected to secure the breaches in the causeways as they passed, or at least the rash Alvarado had not done so with his command, his earlier lesson unheeded; and when the Christians were hurled backwards—for their easy entrance into the great square of the city had been in the nature of a decoy—disaster befel them, which at one moment seemed as if it would be a repetition of that of the Noche Triste. 'The moment I reached that fearful bridge,' Cortes wrote in his dispatches, 'I saw the Spaniards returning in full flight.' Remaining to hold the breech if possible, and cover the retreat, the chivalrous Cortes almost lost his life from a furious attack by the barbarians in their canoes, and was only saved by the devotion of his own men and Indian allies, who gave their lives in his rescue. Word, nevertheless, had gone forth among the men that Cortes had fallen; and the savages, throwing before the faces of Alvarado and Sandoval the bloody heads of decapitated Spaniards, cried tauntingly the name 'Malintzin,' which was that by which Cortes was known among the Mexicans. Men and horses rolled into the lake; dead bodies filled the breaches; the Christians and their allies were beaten back, and 'as we were all wounded it was only the help of God which saved us from destruction,' wrote Bernal Diaz. Indeed, both Cortes and the Spaniards only escaped, on these and other occasions, from the Aztec's desire to take them alive for sacrifice.

"Once more, after disastrous retreats and heavy loss, the bleeding and discouraged Spaniards lay in their camp, as evening fell. Of dead, wounded and captured, the Spaniards missed more than a hundred and twenty of their comrades, and the Tlascalans a thousand, whilst valuable artillery, guns and horses were lost. But listen! what is that mournful, penetrating sound which smites the Christians' ears? It is the war-god's drum, and even from where the Spaniards stand there is visible a procession ascending the steps of the teocalli, and, to their horror, the forms of their lost comrades are seen within it: whose hearts are doomed to be torn out living from their breasts to smoke before the shrine of Huitzilopochtli, the war-devil of their enemies. From that high and fearful place their comrades' eyes must be gazing with despairing look towards the impotent Spanish camp, glazing soon in death as the obsidian knives of the priests performed their fiendish work. The disastrous situation of the Spaniards was made worse by the desertion, at this juncture, of the Tlascalan and other allies. Awed by a prophecy sent out confidently by the Aztec priests, that both Christians and allies should be delivered into their hands before eight days had passed (prophecy or doom, which the priests said, was from the mouth of the war-god, appeased by the late victory), the superstitious Indians of Cortes's forces sneaked off in the night.

"Continued reverses, in the face of long-continued action and desire for the attaining a given end, forges in the finer calibre of mind a spirit of unremitting purpose. Blow after blow, which would turn away the ordinary individual from his endeavour, serves to steel the real hero to a dispassionate and persistent patience, and the purpose from its very intensity becomes almost a sacred cause, and seems to obtain from the unseen powers of circumstance success at last. So with Cortes and others of the Spaniards. The period prescribed by the somewhat rash prophecy of the Aztec priests and their infernal oracle having passed without anything remarkable having taken place, the Tlascalan and Texcocan allies, upbraided and warned by the Spaniards' messengers, now sneaked back to resume the attack against the city. The Aztecs had sought to cause disaffection in outlying places by sending round the bloody heads of decapitated Spaniards and horses, but with little effect. Cortes then prepared for a final effort. The plan adopted was to be slower but surer than the former one of simple slaughter. It was determined to raze the city to the ground; to destroy the buildings step by step, fill up the canals, and so lay waste the whole area from the outside, so that unobstructed advance might be maintained.

"The execution of this plan was begun. The city ends of the causeways were captured and held; street after street was demolished, and canal after canal filled up amid scenes of incessant fighting and slaughter. Day after day the Spaniards returned to their work; day after day with admirable tenacity the inhabitants of Tenochtitlan disputed the ground inch by inch, watered with the blood of themselves, their women and their children. Their supplies cut off, famine and pestilence wrought more terrible havoc among them—crowded as they gradually became into one quarter of the city—than the arms of the Spaniards and the Tlascalans. At the termination of each day's work the Spanish prepared an ambuscade for the enemy, drawing them on by seeming to retire, and massacring them with the artillery and gun-fire and lances, to say nothing of the weapons of their savage allies. On one of these occasions 'the enemy rushed out yelling as if they had gained the greatest victory in the world,' Cortes wrote in his dispatches, and 'more than five hundred, all of the bravest and principal men, were killed in this ambush.' He added, and it was a common occurrence, 'our allies'—the Indians—'supped well that night, cutting up and eating their captives!' During the days of this terrible siege the famous catapult was made, an extraordinary engine to discharge great stones upon the enemy. This was to enable the Spaniards to husband their powder, which was getting low, and the Aztecs watched the construction of this machine with certain fear. It was completed and set to work, but the builder, a Spanish soldier of inventive faculty, nearly played the part of the engineer hoist with his own petard, for the great stone fired rose, it is true, but went straight up and descended again upon the machine, which was ever afterwards the laughing-stock of the army.

"Further severe losses were now inflicted upon the beleaguered inhabitants, as more ammunition had been obtained. Peace had again been offered by the Spaniards, and again refused by the Aztecs. An Aztec chief of high rank had been captured, and then returned to Guatemoc as a peace envoy. The Mexicans' reply was to execute and sacrifice the unfortunate emissary, and then collecting their forces they poured out upon the causeways like a furious tide, which seemed as if it would sweep all before it. But the Spaniards were prepared. The narrow causeways were commanded by the artillery, which poured such a deadly hail upon the enemy's numbers that they returned fleeing to the city.

"And soon the end approaches. The division led by Cortes made a fierce assault; and whilst the battle raged the Spaniards observed that the summit of one of the teocallis was in flames. It was the work of Alvarado's men, who had penetrated already to the plaza. Forces were joined, and the inhabitants of the city, driven into one quarter thereof, still made their stubborn and—now—suicidal stand. For the streets were piled up with corpses, the Aztecs refraining from throwing the bodies of their slain into the lake, or outside the city, in order not to show their weakness. Pestilence and famine had made terrible inroads upon the population. Miserable wretches, men, women and children, were encountered Wandering about careless of the enemy, only bent upon finding some roots, bark or offal which might appease the hunger at their vitals. The salt waters of the lake, which they had been obliged to drink, for the Spaniards had cut the aqueduct which brought the fresh water from Chapultepec, had caused many to sicken and die. Mothers had devoured their dead children; the bodies of the slain had been eaten, and the bark gnawed from the trunks of trees. In their dire extremity some of the chiefs of the beleaguered city called Cortes to the barricade. He went, trusting that capitulation was at hand, for, as both he and his historians record, the slaughter was far from their choosing. 'Do but finish your work quickly,' was the burden of their parley. 'Let us go and rest in the heaven of our war-god; we are weary of life and suffering. How is it that you, a son of the Sun, tarry so long in finishing, when the Sun himself makes circuit of the earth in a day, and so accomplishes his work speedily?'

"This remarkable appeal struck renewed pity to the heart of Cortes, and once more he begged them to surrender and avoid further suffering, and the Spaniards drew off their forces for a space. But the inexorable Guatemoc, although he sent an embassy to say he would hold parley, and the Spaniards waited for him, did not fulfil the promise at the last moment. Incensed at this behaviour, the Spaniards and the Tlascalans renewed the attack with overpowering energy on the one part and barbaric savagery on the other. Contrary to the orders of the Spaniards, their savage allies gave no quarter, but murdered men, women and children in fiendish exultation. The stench of the dead in the beleaguered city was overpowering; the soil was soaked with blood; the gutters ran as in a rain-storm, say the chroniclers, and, wrote Cortes to the King of Spain: 'Such slaughter was done that day on land and water that killed and prisoners numbered forty thousand; and such were the shrieks and weeping of women and children that there were none of us whose hearts did not break.' He adds that it was impossible to contain the savage killing and torturing by their allies the Tlascalans, who practised such cruelty as had never been seen, and 'out of all order of nature.'

"At nightfall the attacking forces drew off, leaving the remainder of the inhabitants of the stricken city to consider their position. It is stated that the Tlascalans made a great banquet of the flesh of the fallen Aztecs, and that on this and other occasions they fished up the bloated bodies of their enemies from the lake and devoured them! At sunrise on the following day Cortes and a few followers entered the city, hoping to have a supplication for terms from Guatemoc. The army was stationed outside the walls, ready, in the event of a refusal—the signal of which should be a musket-shot—to pour in and strike the final blow. A parley was entered into as before, which lasted several hours. 'Do you surrender?' Cortes demanded. The final reply of Guatemoc was, 'I will not come: I prefer to die where I am: do your worst.'

"A musket-shot rang out upon the air; the Spaniards and their allies fell on to merciless slaughter: cannons, muskets, arrows, slings, lances—all told their tale upon the huddled mass of panic-stricken people, who, after presenting a feeble and momentary front, poured forth upon the fatal causeways to escape. Drowned and suffocated in the waters of the lake, mowed down by the fire from the brigantines, and butchered by the brutal Tlascalans, women, children and men struggled and shrieked among that frightful carnage; upon which it were almost impious to dwell further. Guatemoc, with his wife and children, strove to escape, and the canoe containing them was already out upon the lake, when a brigantine ran it down and captured him. All resistance was at an end. No sign of life or authority remained among the ruined walls; the fair city by the lake was broken and tenantless, its idols fallen, and its people fled. The Homeric struggle was over; the conquest of Mexico was accomplished."[10]

Under the long rule of the viceroys that followed the Conquest, Mexico lived her life in a mediaeval but often peaceful and not unhappy state, and had Spain but understood her and developed the resources of the land and protected her simple Indian folk instead of exploiting them, and at the same time antagonizing the colonists, there is no reason why a magnificent and permanent Spanish empire should not have grown to being.

We have remarked elsewhere on the abundant mineral wealth of the country. The great silver deposits of Guanajuato were discovered as a result of a camp-fire made on the rocks by some muleteers, who found refined silver among the ashes, which the heat had smelted from them. The great "mother lode" here yielded up enormous wealth. The pleasing city of Zacatecas to-day grew from another discovery of silver ores, which produced a value, up to the middle of last century, of nearly eight hundred million dollars. The curious archives of these mines, which still exist, show how carefully the Spaniards worked them. The Pachuca mines, which to-day are still worked, yielded similar wealth, and it was here that the well-known patio or amalgamation process was discovered, with quicksilver from Peru.

There are other centres, scarcely less important, well known to the mineralogist. The mineral-bearing zone of Mexico is sixteen hundred miles long, and yields nearly all the metals known to commerce. Coal, however, is not a frequent product. The country has been described as a paradise for the prospector. The mines are innumerable: almost every hill is pierced or perforated by shafts and galleries, ancient or modern; some are enormous tunnels, or socavones.

CORDOVA AND THE PEAK OF ORIZABA. STATE OF VERA CRUZ.

Vol. I. To face p. 132.

The Mexican native miner is, in his way, expert and active, and with rude appliances performs marvels in the work of ore extraction. Halt a moment by yonder pit in the rocky slope. Look down: a notched pole descends, upon which you would hesitate to venture, giving access to the workings beneath. Yet, in a moment, perhaps, a peon, bearing on his back an enormous load of rock in a hide or sack, will ascend from the bowels of the earth, panting and groaning—we shall hear the noise of his breathing before we see him. He will cast his load at our feet, and from it will roll the gleaming quartz and pyrites, with perhaps the red of the rosicler, or rich oxide ore of silver, or the yellow ochres of the decomposed gold-bearing sulphides, more readily prepared by Nature for treatment and winning of the yellow metal. Or he may bear it to the stream-bed, there to treat it in some primitive stone mill.

Otherwise we may visit huge modern mills where hundreds of stamps are clanging and engines are winding and furnaces are burning, for a host of these exist throughout the land, though disorder and revolution may have suspended their operations.

Many curious products of the vegetable world attract our eyes. Behold yonder stupendous cactus-trees—the organo cactus, whose symmetrical spiny branches like a giant candelabrum, weighing perhaps tons, with their mass of sappy foliage, arise from a single stem, which could be brought down by a stroke of a machete, or wood-knife—that formidable implement or weapon (made perhaps in Birmingham) which the Mexican peon loves to wield or use. Look at the marvellous giant leaves of the juicy maguey, or agave, as long as a man, and see the peon insert his siphon to the heart of the plant to draw forth its sap, which he blows into the goatskin on his back, and from which he will presently make his pulque. This plant, the great American aloe, comes into flower and dies in a few years. It exhausts itself in flowering. In England we call it the century plant, for the exotic lingers long in the unfavourable climate, and with difficulty puts forth its blossoms at all. There, too, are hedges and circas of prickly-pear, or nopal, which yield the delicious wild fig—the cactus familiar to the traveller in the Holy Land and Syria, whence it was taken from Mexico.

In the coastal lands, as before remarked, the feathery coconut-palm waves over the villages, and the elegant leaves of the banana form refreshing groves, and the cacao yields its stores of chocolate. Lovers of this sweetmeat might hear the name of Mexico in gratitude indeed, for is not the very name and product of Aztec origin—the chocolatl of the early folk here? In the tropic forests and plantations the beautiful rubber, the Castilloa elastica-tree, rears its stately foliage, and here, again, are we not indebted to Mexico? Remember it, ye lovers of lawn tennis. For when the early Spaniards arrived they found the Mexicans playing tennis, with balls of rubber, in those curious courts whose ruins still remain in the jungles of Yucatan.

Again, yonder flies the wild turkey. Was he not the progenitor of that noble bird which comes upon our Christmas tables? Here, too, is the zenzontl; or mocking-bird, and a host of gorgeous winged creatures besides.

Through many a desert range and over many a chain of hills, violet in the distance, alluring and remote; past many a sacred well or hill marked by a cross, hard by the paths worn by the generations of bare or sandalled feet we may pass; and here, perchance, by some spring stands a startled native maid, her olla, or great water-pitcher, on her shoulder—stands in classic but unwitting pose. Or through the heat a mounted vaquero rides upon his attenuated mule or horse—for the equine race works hard and eats little here, but bit, spur and the bridle are his till the day he leaves his bones upon the trail—and, "Buenos dias, señor," with doffed hat the horseman gives us as he passes, with ever-ready Mexican courtesy to the foreigner; or he did so until of recent times, when, for reasons we need not here dilate upon, the foreigner has come to be regarded with anything but friendship.

There was always a charm about this old land of Mexico; there still is, despite its recent turbulent history. Small wonder that foreigners in increasing numbers loved to make their life in its quaint towns, to take up land and industry within it.

Of these towns we cannot speak here; Guadalajara, Puebla, Oaxaca and many another invite us to their pleasing streets and ancient buildings. From the Atlantic to the Pacific, from north to south, they are dispersed over the wide area of the Republic.

The southern, or rather easternmost States of Mexico are, as regards their landscape and life, often of peculiar interest, mainly by reason of the more tropical surroundings and the large rivers, such as those that flow into the Gulf of Campeche, in Vera Cruz and Tabasco.

Typical of these rivers are the Grijalva and the Usumacinta. In places lined by dark forests, the banks elsewhere open out to permit of plantations of bananas, tobacco, maize, pineapples, rubber and so forth, and an occasional village, its white walls gleaming among the foliage, the roofs thatched with palm, gives the human touch thereto.

Ascending the river in a slow stern-wheel steamer, we remark an occasional canoe, laden with skins and other produce, or moored inshore whilst its occupants are fishing in the plentifully stocked waters. There are great trees festooned with masses of moss and with trailing lianas, where monkeys play by day and from whence at night their howling falls on the ear. The white heron and aigret, whose snowy plumage is so valuable an article of commerce, startled by the passage of the boat, sail gracefully away to the bends of the river, and flocks of parrots, similarly disturbed, scream their defiance, whilst wild ducks and cranes and birds of the brightest plumage are in sight at every moment. The alligators, large and small, that throng the shoals project their grotesque forms into the water, offering a mark to the gun of the idle huntsman.

In the flower world Nature is often gorgeously arrayed here. Pure white lilies lie at the base of flowering trees that rise in a mass of bloom for forty feet or more, of a profusion and beauty almost inconceivable. The queen of the banks, the stately coco-palm, carries its load of nuts, waiting for nothing but the gatherer of a harvest provided by Nature. Here, too, is the cinchona-tree, with its bright, smooth red trunk and branches and rich green leaves, offering its virtues of quinine bark. The arnica plant, with its daisy-like yellow flowers, and the morning glory of rich and brilliant hue abound, and the orchids—"not the dwarfed product of a northern hothouse, but huge, entrancing, of the richest browns, the tenderest greens, the most vivid reds and the softest yellow, sometimes as many as half a dozen upon one tree"—decorate the decayed trunks of the trees. There are, too, natural plantations of wild pineapples, and many fruits besides.

A good deal of land in these regions is capable of cultivation, and, extremely fertile, yields profitable returns. But means of transport are, of course, defective, although the rivers offer long lines of communication. The Indians do not love work, except inasmuch as such may fill their own small requirements, for in so bountiful a region Nature supplies them with many things necessary for life, which a very few hours' labour will supplement for a whole year. There is rivalry between the established planters for the available labour, and peonage is largely carried out.

In Yucatan, the labour system upon the plantations of the Mexican millionaire hemp-growers of the peninsula has been described as little more than slavery by some writers. But great wealth and some measure of progress have resulted from this special Yucatan industry, and Merida, the capital city, shows these elements in marked degree.

The Yucatan peninsula is a curious limestone plain, originally covered, and still covered in great part, with tropical jungle, riverless, but with underground streams. The water was used by the ancient builders of the Maya cities here, whose beautifully sculptured palaces and pyramid temples are among the chief archæological wonders of Spanish America. They constructed wells adjacent to the buildings—the curious cenotes, or sacred wells.

The lore of these silent, buried temples, over-run by the jungle, the haunt now of wild creatures, is fascinating in its mystery. Some observers have likened their details of the façades of these structures to Hindu temples, others to Egyptian, and so forth, whilst others stoutly proclaim them to be of purely autochthonous culture.[11] This culture area, we have already seen, extended into Guatemala.

To turn for a moment now to the Pacific coast of Mexico, this presents its own special points of interest. From hence may have come the Toltecs originally, with their wonderful native knowledge and stone-shaping arts, among famous objects of whose handiwork is the famous Calendar Stone, to be seen in the Museum of Mexico. This remarkable stone shows the early Mexicans to have had a more exact division and calculation of solar time than their contemporaries, the cultured nations of Europe. However, the principal Toltec remains are not upon the Pacific coast, but at Tula, on the Plateau, which appears to have been their ancient capital.

Upon the long Pacific coastline Mexico possesses several important seaports, to some of which access may be gained by railway, and many picturesque places rarely heard of by the outside world, together with vast areas of fruitful land and valuable forests. This littoral, indeed; forms a region which must some day take its place in the economy of the globe. The long peninsula of Lower California, forming an isolated part of Mexico, is in many respects remarkable, and into the head of the Gulf flows the Colorado River, with many peculiar characteristics.

What we have here said as to the topography of Mexico, with its beautiful mountains, rivers, archæological remains, cities and so forth, is little more than an index to a vast field of interest, which, however, must be studied elsewhere. We are now bidden to cast a further glance at the people who have their being upon the diversified surface of the Republic.

A small proportion only of the Mexicans are white—perhaps ten per cent. The remainder are of varying shades of brown. But there is no "colour line," although, naturally, the purest European blood is found among the upper and governing classes.

However, the brown race has produced some of the best of Mexico's people. The famous Juarez, the lawyer-president who preceded Diaz, and who was responsible for some of the most important measures of reform, was a pure Indian by birth, and Diaz himself was proud of his partly aboriginal ancestry. In fact, it cannot be said that there is any dividing line in the composition of the Mexicans. The bulk of the people are thus of mestizo or mixed race, but there are various districts where only pure Indians are found.

The working population of the country, perhaps three-quarters of the total, are peones. Peonage is a state of what might be termed debt-bondage. They dwell upon the great landed estates, dependent for their livelihood upon the owners of these, unable to leave them, and are paid their small wage largely in goods under a species of "truck system." They are often purposely kept in debt. Their economic condition is a low one. They own nothing of the land upon which they dwell; they carry on occupations which are not profitable to themselves, and are subjected to many abuses in this respect; they dwell in adobe, or dried mud huts, generally of the poorest kind; their food is of the most primitive, and often scanty—meat is an article which rarely enters into their diet; if a cow dies on the plain they cut it up for food—but nevertheless they labour hard from sunrise to sunset upon a diet of maize and beans. This class is almost wholly illiterate, although there has been some improvement of late years in this respect.