The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1885-04-09
CRY or MEXICO.


| police system. At night there IL q
policeman at every corner. He never
patrols the streets, but has lantern
which he sets in the center of the in
tersecting streets, and then retires to O
convenient doorway and sits silent un-
til relieved. In consequence there is q
row OF lanterns in the middle of every
street. Each policeman carries q club
and a revolver, and wears a blanket
around his shoulders. The roundsnen
who patrol the streets are mounted and
carry carbines and sabers, looking like
calrymen. Policemen are invariably
polite, and will stop q street car and
assist lady to enter it as gallantly as
the proudest Castilian. There is a
great deal of drunkenness in Mexico,
but very little fighting. The poems
drink pulque the fermented milk of the
cactus. 1t is queer stuff, and costs
about cents a quart, so that it is with
in the reach of the poorest. There are
said to be 10000 pulque shops in Mex
leo, and they are all profitable, even at
the price of penny glass. Two
! glasses will make a peon happy, and
three will give him the blind staggers
but the after effects of pulque intoxica-
ton are not disagreeable, for it leaves
no headache. The Spaniards drink
cognac and sour wines. Whisky is not
safe beverage for this climate. Amer
lean mixed drinks are not popular, and
the scarcity of ice makes juleps and
that sort of thing expensive.
The stranger in Mexico is always very
thirsty. The rapid evaporation makes
the mouth and throat dry, and water
furnishes only temporary relief The
most refreshing drink is lime Juice in
appollinaris. All the ice used in Mex
leo comes sixty miles from the top of
Popocatapetl, being brought down to
the railroad station on the backs of ma
tives, and costs 10 cents a pound.
From the top of the cathedral spire
you can see the entire city. and the
most striking feature of the view is the
| absence of chimneys. There is not a
chimney in all Mexico, not q stove, or
CRATE, or furnace. All the cooking
is done with charcoal in Dutch ovens,
and, while the gas is sometimes of
! fensive, one soon becomes used to it,
Coal costs S25 ton, and wool SIG a
cord. The former is imported from
England, and the wool is all brought
from the mountains.
On the railroads mesquite is used for
! fuel. This shrub abounds on all the
hillsides, and is of very tough fiber
Fuel constitutes about 80 per cent. of
the entire cost of railway operation. A
railroad Manager reports that his pur-
chasing agent secured 300 wooden
saints for fuel, which he bought at 80
cents apiece from the natives. who stole
them from the churches.
About half the churches and cathe-
drals in Mexico are no longer used for
worship. and they have been stripped
of everything that will burn or can be
| sold. Since the revolution which end
ed with the death of Macmillan, the
church, at one time more potent than
the Government, has been in state of
seeming decay. 1t still controls the
minds and morals of the common peo-
pie, and in the country provinces the
padre is the most influential citizen /;
but the revolutionists deprived him of
his political power, and robbed him of
| the wealth he held in the name of the
church. Every monastery and convent
was seized by the Government, all the
church property was denounced and
confiscated, and the church is no longer
permitted to hold real estate. Most Of
its revenues are cut off, and private
citizens are now invested with the titles
to church property which they hold as
| trustees.
Many cathedrals have been stripped
of their gold and silver ornaments, the
shrine of the Miraculous Virgin of
Guadalupe alone having been spared,
and that only because she is the patron
saint of Mexico. In this church, which
stands at the top of hill about five
miles from the city, on the spot where
the Virgin is said to have appeared to
the shepherd, there is balustrade
seventy feet long and three feet high,
of solid silver. Not long ago an enter
prising American offered to replace it
! with silver-plated affair of the same
design, and pay q bonus of $500, coo,
but the church authorities declined the
offer The solid silver chandelier in
the cathedral at Puebla was recently
melted down, and made sixty thousand
silver dollars.
One of the most curious features of
Mexican lie Is the uldnner OF cOnuucC-
ing funerals. Some of the funerals go
to the cemetery on the street cars, cof-
fin and all. The poorest people, who
cannot afford to pay for carriages, or
even street-car fare, carry their dead
through the streets on their shoulders,
and borrow or hire a coffin for the occa-
sion. When the cemetery is reached
and the obsequies are over, the body is
transferred to box, if the friends are
able to buy one, or wrapped in a
blanket, and the coffin is returned to
its owner. The scarcity of wood makes
collins expensive. 1t is the custom to
set photographs of the dead in the
gravestones. Some of the tombs in the
fashionable cemeteries are very ex-
pensive, the beautiful Mexican onyx
being used in the most lavish manner.
City of MericO letter.
AN attempt is being made to account
for the remarkable powers exhibited by