Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-04-20
MATTERS IN MEXICO.
The American Invaders-Life az I'll
Mexican CapitaI-A Peculiar PennIe-

The American Invaders-Life az the
Mexican CapitaI-A Peculiar People.
ye'o Aesic0 LITTER to n y. Graphic March 90
The air is thick with rumors of ian
American InYasiOn"-a peaceful invasion
tins time, Of course. There is "a train Of
oOV' coming over the newly finished Cen
tral line, they say-as if any train could
bring 50 many over that road from any
where. | hope this street rumOr is not
strictly true, for careful canvass yester-
day showed all the hotels full except two,
and they had only ten vacant rooms in all.
And there are hardly any boarding houses
here worthy of the name
The hotels: Well. they are pretty bad
Iney are generally old palaces built about
courts, flower filled and open to the sky.
giving an impression of lOYeliness and
alrlness, but most of the rooms are cold
and dark-mOre like tanks than dwelling
places-and no meals are to he had except
al adjacent restaurants. Nobody about
the hotel understands English, and the
guest must study Spanish before he can
even have the pleasure of conveying to the
manager a sense of his discomfort.
a movement IS on foot for a large, good
American hotel here. One is surely
needed, for Mexico has a lovely climate
the year round, though the capital itself is
so unheathful as to be dangerous as a
residence during the rainy season. The
whole OF this vast plateau, outside Of the
small Valley of Mexico twenty-five miles
square, is a sanitaTium for Americans the
year round, who would find nothing i'm the
world more delightful and exhiliarating;
and the City OF Mexico itself is equally
attractive, excepting in June. July, Au-
gust and September. when the steady rains
and the lack or drainage give rise to fe-
brile conditions.
| shall not be surprised to see 5000
Americans of pulmonary or bronchial ten
denotes come here next year for their
health, and to have the number double
every year for some years. Think of land
where every man, woman and child is an
lnialllble signal Service prophet and can
fOreSee what the weather is going TO be to-
morrow afternoon, three DAYS hence. next
week! Not only IS the temperature about
the same, never varying more than fifteen
or eighteen degrees the year round. but
for eight months Of the year it is ALWAYS
pleasant, and during the other four
months it is always pleasant excepting
certain rather definite hours of every day.
There are other considerations that will
make Mexico attractive TO Americans;
the landscapes, the houses and the cos
tunes and manners Of the people are all
strange than those Of any part
of Europe | have visited. The view Of the
streets out Of my window recalls old Bible
pictures; the plain, flat-roOfed houses,
with outside of stuccO: portal broad as
a barn door the only entrance; people
clad each in "a cotton shirt and pair of
white drawers, moving languidly about;
diminutiye dOnkeys carrying loads twice
as large as themselves, so bulky some
times as completely to hide the bearer;
the grotesque water peddlers; COWS and
goats driven around and MIXED at the
doors, and the warm sun in every season
gnmmerlng over all-it irresistiblv re-
minds one Of the street yistas of Jerusa-
lem, 5appa and Damascus. just outside
of every one Of the 10000 doors in this
city sits wooden bowl of some sort con-
tanning water. This is for the dogs in the
street; and there is a fine OF 50 for every
householder who fails to put this dish out
and keep II replenished ali the time be-
tween the yernal equinox and the summer
sOlstice. Yesterday the queer display was
made for the first time this year.
This looks like real kindness to animals.
but 1t IS in sharp contrast to the bull fights
IN the suburbs, the cock fights in the city,
and the brutality Of the spur with which
the Mexican rides his horse. Somewhat
lncongruous, also, seems the circum-
stance that an uncOmmOnly large proper
tion Of the well-watered dogs here have
only three good legs and that they hObble
along holding up the broken one so that it
Will not touch the stones. So | suppose
that the drink is set in the dOOrways, not
for the comfort of the dogs but for the
protection Of the citizens.
have said that all Of Mexico except
this city IS salubriOus the year round; but
by this mean all on the high plateau of
1000 feet, which really constitutes three
fourths Of the country. This city might
be removed from the list of exceptions if
it would spend few million dollars for
drainage. not by completing rhe preDOs-
ferrous canal to the Gull of Mexico, begun
$50 years ago, on which 100000 900 has
already been wasted, but by dispOsing of
the sewage according to the dictates of
modern science. What this beautiful city
needs to more than restore the tabled
beauty and fertility of the Garden of the
AZtecs Is to put IN operation here a system
like that now so successful at Pullman
ILL.,, where the sewage is allowed to run
into central sink and is easily pumped
thereirOm upon the unfertile lands around
the town. The solid matter there passes
speedily INTO vegetation, producing fruits
and flowers. I know Of no place in the
world that would feel the benefit Of such
system as Mexico would. excepting. per
haps, the sand barrens of Long Island, If
they could be fed with the sewage Of New
York and Brooklyn Here it would be es-
not only would the fertilization be used
to the very best advantage, but the liquid
portion Of the drainageNfor the greater
part of the whole would make these
parched fields blossom like Tadm0r all
through the rainless summer months. Not
only would Mexico thus become one Of the
three or four most lovely cities in the
world, with avenues as broad and hand
some as those Of Paris and Washington,
in the midst of a garden radiant with
bloom twelve months in every year, but 1t
would become one of the most healthful
cities on the planet-perhaps the most
healthful-the Mecca OF every sight-see-
ing tourist and sanitarium for the inya-
lids OF both hemispheres. But it is a terri
bic pity that such an opportunity should
be neglected, when. for an expenditure
quite within the ability of the people, this
city, now under cloud of distrust in
spite of the eternal summer, might quick
ly become renowned tor attractiveness
among the capitals Of the world.