Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras | Page 5

few houses and many gardens and trees,
thickening farther on. All about are mountains. The Silla (Saddle), a
sharp rugged height backing the city on the right, has a notch in it much
like the seat of a Texas saddle; to the far left are fantastic sharp peaks,
and across the plain a ragged range perhaps fifteen miles distant shuts
off the view. Behind the chapel stand Los Dientes, a teeth or saw-like
range resembling that behind Leceo in Italy. Only a young beggar and
his female mate occupied the ruined chapel, built, like the town, of
whitish stone that is soft when dug but hardens upon exposure to the air.
They cooked on the littered floor of one of the dozen rooms, and all the
walls of the chamber under the great dome were set with pegs for birds,
absent now, but which had carpeted the floor with proof of their
frequent presence.
At five the sun set over the city, so high is the Dientes range, but for
some time still threw a soft light on the farther plain and hills.
Compared with our own land there is something profoundly peaceful in
this climate and surroundings. Now the sunshine slipped up off the
farther ranges, showing only on the light band of clouds high above the
farther horizon, and a pale-faced moon began to brighten, heralding a
brilliant evening.
Fertile plains of corn stretched south of the city, but already dry, and

soon giving way to mesquite and dust again. Mountains never ceased,
and lay fantastically heaped up on every side. We rose ever higher,
though the train kept a moderate speed. At one station the bleating of a
great truckload of kids, their legs tied, heaped one above the other, was
startlingly like the crying of babies. We steamed upward through a
narrow pass, the mountains crowding closer on either hand and
seeming to grow lower as we rose higher among them. The landscape
became less arid, half green, with little or no cactus, and the breeze
cooled steadily. Saltillo at last, five thousand feet up, was above the
reach of oppressive summer and for perhaps the first time since leaving
Chicago I did not suffer from the heat. It was almost a pleasure to
splash through the little puddles in its poorly paved streets. Its plazas
were completely roofed with trees, the view down any of its streets was
enticing, and the little cubes of houses were painted all possible colors
without any color scheme whatever. Here I saw the first _pulquerías_,
much like cheap saloons in appearance, with swinging doors,
sometimes a pool table, and a bartender of the customary
I-tell-yer-I'm-tough physiognomy. Huge earthen jars of the fermented
cactus juice stood behind the bar, much like milk in appearance, and
was served in glazed pots, size to order. In Mexico _pulquería_ stands
for saloon and _peluquería_ for barber-shop, resulting now and then in
sad mistakes by wandering Yankees innocent of Spanish.
There were a hundred adult passengers by actual count, to say nothing
of babies and unassorted bundles, in the second-class car that carried
me on south into the night. Every type of Mexican was represented,
from white, soft, city-bred specimens to sturdy countrymen so brown as
to be almost black. A few men were in "European" garb. Most of them
were dressed _á la peón_, very tight trousers fitting like long leggings,
collarless shirts of all known colors, a gay faja or cloth belt, sometimes
a coat--always stopping at the waist. Then last, but never least, the
marvelous hat. Two peons trying to get through the same door at once
was a sight not soon to be forgotten. There were felt and straw hats of
every possible grade and every shade and color except red, wound with
a rich band about the crown and another around the brim. Those of
straw were of every imaginable weave, some of rattan, like baskets or
veranda furniture. The Mexican male seems to be able to endure

sameness of costume below it, but unless his hat is individual, life is a
drab blank to him. With his hat off the peon loses seven eights of his
impressiveness. The women, with only a black sort of thin shawl over
their heads, were eminently inconspicuous in the forest of hatted men.
Mournfully out of the black drizzling night about the station came the
dismal wails of hawkers at their little stands dim-lighted by pale
lanterns; "_Anda pulque!_" Within the car was more politeness--or
perhaps, more exactly, more unconscious consideration for others--than
north of the Rio Grande. There were many women among us, yet all the
night through there was not a suggestion of indecency or annoyance.
Indian blood largely predominated, hardy, muscular, bright-eyed
fellows, yet in conduct all were caballeros. Near me