The Arkansaw traveler., 1886-02-06
A Wonderful Mexican Garden.

Cuernavaca is celebrated as the home of the conqueror Cortez, says a cores pondent of the Providence Journal, and the site of his curious palace of hewn stone. But it is just as celebrated for the great Borda Gardens.
 The Borda is not what it once was when the hand of neglect was lifed from its wonderful forest of flowers. This beautiful garden has been sad ever since the death of its imperial lover, the arch duke of Austria, Maximilian, emperor of Mexico. The vegetation is unkept, and the dishevelled foliage falls over the trees, till they seem almost human in their sor- row and resemble that poor demented woman in the European castle who still fondly fancies that the golden rim of Mexlco's crown rests on the head of her husband Maximilian. In this mournful garden the branches of the trees seem twisted in paroxysms of pain and flung in desperate and threatening attitude to- wards the sky. The great pond is cov- cred with mantle of green, that crape of waters. The shaded aisles are dc. serted. The only gardeners who water the flowers are the clouds of heaven the only workman who trims the trees is sombre autumn. But on entering this spot the sentiment of admiration is at once aroused. The visitor instinctively enters on dptoe as if he were treadipg some enchanted ground, as if he feared to wake the birds asleep upon the branches, the dIyads hidden in the old asb trees or the nymphs under the never ruffied water of the ponds Face to face with nature in this lonely trysting place the heart of the tourist is drawn out to- wards nature, while love for the beauti- ful is led by the hand of fear through the scented walks of La Borda.
 The silence of solitude rests over the thousands of acres. The voice of man is unheard. But the trees, the bending flowers, the ripping streams and the soughing breezes seem to speak. Outside the sarden the tropic sunlight ot the Tierra Caliente falls like molten lead inside the air is refreshing, and the aisles arched with giant palms are as cool as the sisles of great cathedral. The first feeling experienced is such as is felt when one enters great palace. But here no liverted lackey or armed slave tries to eject us. The dryads do not issue fir pm ash or cedar to dismiss us. This great garden cannot be compared with the uniform and carefully cultivated gardens round the City of Mexico. It is an i'm mense fDrest of flowers and fruits. Even the dead pond is of unusual proportions. Maximilian of Austria, prince and artist as he was, spent there the happiest hours of his stormy reign in Mexico, but the angel with the fl lming sword drove him and his brilliant Carlotta out of that para disc, never to enter again. Never again will that romantic adventurer tread those suspended gardens, like the hanging gar dens of Ssmiramis, poised above the Tierra Caliente that lies below those cliffs. The gardens cover some of the most beautiful mountain slopes ip all the state of Morelos, whore they were first laid out by Count Borda, Spanish miner, who l became millionaire by precious metals he extracted from the celebrated Tasco | mines In the state of Guerrero. They are desolate and deserted now. But some new Mexican or American millionaire may some day people with marble statues those deep forests, and may throw | heavens sunlight down through those | roofs of fragrance. Then will disappear that spell of enchantment. Cortsz and his mistress, Malluche, will then no | longer haunt La Borda, nor the foot steps of return" be heard of Maximilian | and Carlotta. Msdco's children of to- | morrow may play In those now silent | shades aud under those talism anic trees. |