CHAPTER V.

FURTHER DAYS IN MEXICO.

IN one important respect I prefer Puebla, with its population of seventy thousand, to Mexico city with its population of some two hundred and sixty thousand. Not that, taking all things into consideration, I would rather live in the latter city, but that I prefer both its situation and its air. Puebla is built upon uneven ground, so that there is a chance of drainage; and in a more open position, so that there is much more ventilation. Water runs through the streets and runs away. Mexico, the capital city, concerning which it is perhaps now time that I should speak with more detail (having gradually become more familiar with it), surprised me at first by its aspect and its position. I may candidly say that it disappointed me as to both.

It must have frequently happened to many of us that, when our interest has been excited with regard to any spot or person long before we have witnessed the reality, we have at last drawn so fixed a picture of the object in our imagination that the preconceived figure refuses to be displaced by

the real one when seen, and there exists a species of contest between the two. I remember this happening to me in the case of the city of Arequipa in Peru, which I had imagined from its height above the sea must be a hanging craggy city. But I found it built upon a perfectly flat plain, though close among the mountains.

I may say the same as regards Mexico city, the height of which, by the way, almost equals that of Arequipa. Nor were there wanting in this case early impressions of beauty, and even of grandeur, arising from exaggerated writings. In the reality, though lying within and very near the crown of a wide oval formed by mountains more or less distant—the two chief, Popocatapetl and Iztaccihuatl, being (as I have said) the only two snow-capped-the valley of Mexico is as flat and as green as a billiard table, and the city is, of course, as flat as the valley. But the position of Arequipa, to which I have referred, though also lying on a plain, is far and far finer as regards grand scenery than that of Mexico, albeit the city and the valley of Quilca are as nothing compared with the city and the abounding valley of Mexico. Arequipa may be said to lie quite among the mountains. On approaching it by railway, you run zig-zagging among the rocks with the Quica rushing down in a gorge below you, through the brown sterility, fringed on both sides with a green ribbon of fertility; while in front lies the city, closely backed by the snow-covered

cone of the Misti, with his nineteen thousand feet of height above the sea, and the spreading Chicaña and Pichu-Pichu handsomely flanking him on either side.

Now the approach to Mexico by the railway, though its cathedral and eighteen parish churches in the distance look well, is really very poor, and the very opposite of imposing. For there are no overhanging mountains; the plain though fertile is damp and even marshy; and the outskirts through which the railway runs present mere scattered buildings of mean and unengaging aspect. Nor is the city itself qualified to make any boast whatever of general architectural beauty. The streets are long, and generally wide; but the houses, though built of good stone, are, for the most part, flat and monotonous, and are rarely of more than two storeys high. All are built in the cubic, or flat-roofed, form, and in what are called quadras, or squares; the streets running at right angles to one another, as is the case in the example nearer home, of Turin. As from the flatness of the position there is at present little or no chance of drainage, its ground is moist and sodden. I have heard this compared to a thick pudding crust: and it is most certain that, in spite of the brilliant atmosphere that must be breathed at such a height, malaria often exists throughout the city, and the mortality rate is high. The ground floors of many of the houses are damp. In some cases, indeed, houses have gradually sunk down, so that what

was the ground floor has turned itself into an under floor; and in some of the best built houses-I will take the property of the London Bank of Mexico and South America as an example, which is a strong cube building in a good part of the citythe moisture oozes through the stone' pavement of the manager's room. I have seen, moreover, one or two church towers that may serve to remind one of the graceful campanile of Pisa, though only in one respect they lean from the upright. Nor is the city much improved by the vicinity of the four lakes, of which that of Tezcoco is the largest and the nearest, lying almost on a level with the plaza; nor again, are the neighbouring meadows an advantage, being in many places marshy, though productive. In the days of Montezuma Mexico was, in fact, a water city; he humbly spoke to Cortés about his insular position, and, whatever may be said or sung of them, positions of this kind sound far more pleasantly in description than they prove to be in reality. Mexico was formerly a species of Venice, but without the sea water; and to-day it is a Venice dried off.

This brings me to speak of what were called the 'chenampas," or floating gardens, lying along the canal of the Viga, which connects Mexico with one of the lakes. These gardens no longer float, but have become fixed to the ground. All romance upon the subject of them is as surely dead as Montezuma. But let me record for them a few lines from Prescott

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who is supposing the Spaniards' first view of them: "Here they beheld those fairy islands of flowers, overshadowed occasionally by trees of considerable size, rising and falling with the gentle undulation of the billows." I cannot but suspect that many would rather read thus of them than paddle about among them. Their construction is supposed to have been first suggested to the Indians by the separation of masses of earth from the shores, but which were still held together by roots. In endeavouring to keep these together by artificial means the next step would naturally be developed into making new and independent frame works from any fitting materials, and filling them with earth or the bottoms of the shallow

waters.

Fruits, vegetables and flowers, are grown here and sold in Mexico at good profit. Whether the pursuit is healthy I do not know, but the produce is good. As regards the flowers, I can truly say that even in Paris and Rome I have never seen any more beautiful, or nosegays, great and small, more beautifully made. They are highly artistical, and nothing but a love for flowers could inspire their production. The market place for these flowers stands in the Plaza of the cathedral. It is an open building, of pillars and roof only, and of a parallelogram form and not large. But the sight and the scent of its stalls on a fine fresh morning might fairly be called enchanting.

Nor are the fruits insignificant. Among those