Wichita eagle., 1888-06-07

monIously dumped, thence trotted away
to the imposingly walled cemetery.
where he is pulled out of this hearse on
legs and slid into the hole prepared for
all that can't make live of it: and thus
do the defunct of the land of the Monte
zumas regularly scratch out for glory and
| for home whose many mansions are
not fashioned from sinking black mud
and adobes, whose straw has been raked
from dung heaps.
Few of our readers, especially our dear
prchibitionists, but what would set
higher value than ever upon pure, cold.
wholesome water, once they visited any
half dozen of the thousand towns and
cities of that country. In the early his
tory of that people wherever spring
was discovered there town was founded.
The spring proving in time, inadequate,
the long, costly aqueduct reaching some
mountain stream would have to be re-
sorted to. The entire city of Zacatecas
is furnished with water by one single
fountain thus supplied. The fountain or
its reservoir is permitted to fill in the
evening. While SO doing from one end
of the city to the other come women
bearing their huge water-pots upon
their shoulders. The evening that we
were there an armed army and police Off
Ger stood guard, and to give the word
of permission to the waiting throng,
In the meantime the circling ranks of
eXpectant women, who stood patiently
holding their pots. their picturesque
rebosas thrown lightly over shoulder and
head, increased by hundreds until, APP:
parently, the throng numbered thou
sands. 1t was indeed pathetic, a
sadly moving scene. Unmurmuringly
had they come, some of them two and
three miles, and as with their great lus-
trously trustful eyes they watched our
party, they awaited the word that wonld
permit them to take as favor that
which God has abundantly supplied most
OF his children. When the signal was at
last given the head Of the circle broke
with military promptness and precision
and in moment hundreds Of eager
forms were bent over the great stone
curbing, which has been worn in deep
grooves by their soft, slight, womanly
bodies as they have thus lain prone
across the hard stone for all their gener
atoms, dipping down their gourds for
the greatest boon known to them, the
simple limpid waters of the mountains.
The death late in some of the towns is
simply fearful. In one hour, in one
place, we saw the bodies of four babes
and one adult being carried out for bur-
ial. The high death rates is, we think,
attributable to an insufficient water sup
ply and the consequent filth recognized
everywhere and more readily by the
strangers nose than by his eyes.
Of course in a trip covering seventeen
days and nights of very rapid travel go
ing and coming upwards of six thousand
miles. there occurred many lively. and
laughable incidents not to speak of a few
of more serious character. Through a
misrepresentation our entire party ran
into the magnificent private apartments
of the palace of governor who was not
at home. At another time two ladies
and one gentleman of our party were in
the hands OF the police. One day while
going through one of the states at
slashing gate, hauling our own engine
water, our engineer, who like all of the
rest of us, was probably fast asleep,
when the coupling between the water
car and the engine gave out and we
were left standing in the cacti desert I'm
til the engineer woke up and reversed
his machine.
One lady of our party was overcome
by the smoke of the incense
in crowded cathedral and had
to be carried out in that interesting con-
dition. Of the scores of times In which
the Undines of that hot latitude shocked
the native modesty of the bald heads of
our party, and the times when artists
models, of both sexes and of all ages.
seemed artitudinizing and posing about
rather too promiscuously for the average
nerve, we will postpone any attempted
picture until the edge Of our own senses
and imagination have, from the lapse of
time and the Intervention of home |
scenes, dulled little. A description |
from our awkward pencil and unframed |!
hand might prove a little too realistically |
vivid for anything but the audience of a |
private gallery.
And so let us end this rambling talk !
by consigning the residue of our promis- |
cuous notes to the waste basket.
Our run home was one of the most |
rapid that ever occurred, no doubt, |
counting its great length, east or west.
One of the young ladies of our party |
having become quite if not seriously |
sick. orders were received from the |
Santa Fe officials at FL Paso to give our
special train precedence over all others
and to roll the wheels as fast as possible. |
We left Ell Paso, Tex, at II O'Clock |
a. m, Friday, and before dark were
in Albuquerque, New Mexico: Saturday
morning after daylight we were in Las
Vegas and before midnight of that same
day We're in Newton, Kansas. From
Trinidad Colorado, to Dodge City from
forty-seven to ffty-eight miles an hour
was made. Five different engines did the |
work. One squirt of seventy eight miles
after leaving La Junta. was made in
eighty-four minutes. which included one !
dead stop and check up The order |
was to run from Kipsley, via the new
cutoff, to Hutchinson, a distance of |
eighty-two miles in eighty-five minutes. |
The engineer couldn't quite make it, but
he made it within hundred minutes, |
and time to spare.