Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1879-10-08
UP POPOCATAPETL.
Why People Don't Often Climb the
Great Mountain.
Correspondence New York Times.

Great mountain.
Correspondence New York Times.
When stranger goes to Mexico every
body who has ever been there asks, Are
you going to climb Popocatapetl?" and
the stranger almost invariably replies,
Certainly" He almost invariably
changes his mind. Popocatapetl is pri-
vste property, owned by resident of
the Mexican capital. In our own coun-
try, where there are plenty Of things to
get nobody would take volcano for
gift, but in Mexico, where there are so
few things to own, they snap up volca-
noes as we would gold mines, and brag
of owning them. There is something
not only unique but impressing in own
ing a volcano. was going down stairs
in the Iturbide Hotel in Mexico one Gay
with native, when the native pointed
out q gentleman coming up stsirs,
and said that he was the owner of the
volcano Popocatapetl. / rather expect.
ed to see fire belching out of his mouth,
and birthstone ooEing out Ct his ears.
But there was nothing of the kind.
His name was Gen Ochoa, and the
guide-book says he is ga perfect gentle
man." so it must be SO. If he is, should
think he would start up his old warn
out volcano when lot of strangers 90
down to see it. But he don't. 1t is not
within the memory of man that this
fraud of a volcano has done any real
work. We might as well cay that old
Roundtop, mp in the Catskills, is
volcano, and put it in the biographies
and advertise it all over the world; Gen
eral Ochoa, who owns this defunct vol
cano; is very ordinary looking person,
and no one, to look at him, would sup.
pose that he pays his board bills from the
Income derived from the sale of brim-
stone, but he does. Some Of his
enemies say that he is under contract to
supply an unmentionable country with
birthstone, but this is hardly to he credit
ed.
There are good many reasons why it
lis not worth while to climb Popocata-
petl. The first and foremost is, several
women have already climbed it, and
where a woman can climb, it is no great
feat for an American young man to go.
In the second place, it is sixty miles
from the capital, which in Mexico means
two days journey over bad roads and in
uncomfortable stages. On the upper
part OF the mountain the atmosphere is
so rare that weak persons have frequent
ly been attacked with hemorrhage Of
the lungs, and some have died. The
Journey is laborious one, and a. good
mile of the way, straight up hill, is
through ashes and cinders foot deep.
Last, but not least. the Journey is very
expensive for stages, board, guides and
costumes. Postscripb.-The game is not
worth the powder. It is great satisfac-
ton to see this mountain from distance;
to sit on the upper piazza of hotel,
with your feet on the railing, and good
Mexican cigar, thinking: $50 that is
Popocatapetl, is it? That is the noun
tain my old country schoolmaster used to
say was the highest in America, with a
pronunciation eighteen degrees wide of
the mark. And now there she is.
Who'd ever have thought it in those
old days of school house benches and
wandering school aliases" While you
are looking at it, if you CHOOSE the right
time of day-after the sun goes down
it disappears before your cigar is finished.
1t is quite possible thst the reader May
have heard that there is no twilight in
the tropics-the sun goes down and in
very few minutes it is dark. The noun
tain grows dim and disappears like the
,school-day memories of its unpronounce-
able name. There is ne fire and brim
stone coming out of the crater, as there
ought to be out of any genuine volcano;
there is nothing but dim spot in the
distance, to be seen only when the moon
gets behind it and lights up its outlines.
Almost any stranger, looking at the
mountain from any elevation in the cap
ital, will estimate that it is four or five
miles away, unless he knows better, for
it is sixty. The air is so very clear there
you can see a long distance. 1t is so
clear Mexican will see five cent piece
iwo miles of, and go for it.