Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-07

i Mexico, and many persons OF wealth. ana
leisure are doing the country. The City Of
Mexico is experiencing a boom in this d.
rection. Railroads are making a vast
change in the country, but the average
Mexican has not overcome his fears of stage
robbers, and starts on a short journey in
great trepidation and only after much
preparation.
CITY OF MEXICO, April IA regular
flood of touring Americans, or, more popu-
larly, 'fYankis," is upon US. The streets
resound with English ''as she is spoke" up
North; there is the "R''-less New England
speech, the queer-vowelled Manhsttanese,
the soft negroish Southern dialect, and the
hattened A and trilled r of the States west
of the Alleghenies and north of the Ohio
river.
This season marks new era in Mexican
tourist travel; more people have come down
here than ever before, and a new class is
beginning to appear, the rich, leisured,
| widely travelled people of the big Atlantic
cities, who have done Europe to safety,
Yoyaged up the Nile, explored the coast
cities of Northern Africa, and shot deer in
the Scottish Highlands. Mexico is new
! place, and as it combines Syria and Spain
| in its scenery, and is decidedly Oriental in
costumes and habits, it is picturesque to a
degree. And then, too, you can journey
hither in a "Montezuma special, gorgeous
in upholstery lounge in library on VIII eels,
| dine luxuriously, and, in 115 hours from
under the shadow of the great white dome
| at Washington, you roll into the Mexican
| Central station with the twin volcanoes
! looking down in their eternal whiteness on
| the Valley of Mexico.
WEALTHY AMERICANS.
| GEORGE Vanderbilt and large party are
| here, quartered at the Iturbide Hotel, doing
the city with guide, and, strange to relate,
| two tall American girls have appeared on
crop-tailed horses on the paseo with no
other escort than groom! In the cafes, in
hotel, eourtyards, ''Eengleesh" is "speek-,
ed'' to the edifcation of the male chamber
maids, who regard the liberal tipping
''YankP' with delight. The brigade Of
guides are up to their eyes in work, the
curiosity dealers are selling buttons of Cor
tez's uniform by the gross, and the idol
manufacturers are getting out good sup
ply of well-smoked Aztec gods to adorn
American parlors and Libraries.
The natives, outside the official class and
the richer people, do not travel about as
Americans are in the habit Of doing. They
stay at home very closely, and the result is
that even in large city like this one soon
gets to know by face about all the society
people. At public gatherings, at balls, par
ties, dinners, the opera and the Jockey Club
races there is the same old familiar crowd.
It absolutely gets to be tiresome. The carl
caturists complain that they are restricted
to a few well-worn types. One soon comes to
wonder at the satisfaction apparently taken
in the everlasting round of drives on the
Paseo de Ia Reforma, in the Sunday morn
ing promenade in the Alameda and in balls
where every face is as familiar as If this
were big village. The world where one
bares ones self is here.
And the truth is that the City of Mexico
is big village The new census assures us
that the city numbers 500, 900 souls, but the
white population Is swamped in the vast
mass of Indians The City of Mexico is a
sort of Bombay, Madras or Calcutta. I
doubt if there are so, 900 whites in this big
city. And of these, say 5000 are in society;
that is, this number furnishes the faces at
the opera, the loungers of the paseo and the
ball goers.
AFRAID TO TRAVEL.
Travelling is regarded as dangerous pas
time. The father of family has business
at Vera Cruz, 264 miles down on the coast
He takes the $50 A. NJ. tram attended by
members of his family, old friends and
three or four servants. If his wife accom-
panies MIN, dozen of ladies come to say
goodby, and you may be sure that this
Tourney to Vera Cruz" has been debated
for month. A Bostonian remarks to his
wife, Lets take a run over to New York"
234 miles off, and away they go in few
hours with no one to see them Off This
"seeing people off, for days railway ride
gets to be bore after awhile, and the fact
that on the return the same thing has got
to be gone through with makes one appre-
ciate what a formidable thing q journey is
in this country.
Perhaps we may find the cause of this
stay-at-home disposition in the traditions of
travel in the stage coach days The "dili-
geneias" were Concord coaches and
traversed the roads between the cities and
larger towns. Seven years ago the dill
geneias were the only means, save by horse
back, of travel between this city and Guada-
lajara, Zoeateeas, Leon, Guanajuato,
Morelia and other points now to be reached
in Pullman cars, or even in vestibuled
trains lighted by electricity. Before Gen.
eral Porfrio Diaz began putting this coun-
try to rights, robbers, in formidable bands,
infested the country roads, and diligencia
robberies were startingly frequent. Peo-
pie going from place to place in the interior
of the country took as few valuables as
possible. and wore their old clothes.
THE GOOD OLD DAYS.
Before the railway from this city to Vera
Cruz was finished, it was quite common for
the coach going to that port to be robbed
three times. Near Puebla the robber would
stop the coach and relieve the passengers
OF their purses, watches, chains and rings
if they wore them, and then let the coach
go on. The next attack would occur down
near Orizaba, in the warm country, where
the robbers would take the outer garments
of the passengers, and when about entering
Vera Cruz a third band of desperadoes
would pluDder the unfortunates Of everv
bit of their undercloth1ng, and it was the
rule to empty the mail bags and give the
passengers newspapers to clothe themselves
with!
Many an eminent Mexican has entered
the "Heroic City" with no thicker suit than
two copies Of the Monitor Republicano. OF
course, the diligeneias were not robbed
every trip, else no one would have dared to
travel. But the "holding up of coaches
was alarmingly frequent. Men of business
made their wills before going on a journey.
and ladies forced to travel trembled for
weeks in anticipation of the perils of the
trip.
nave nearu TOO many OF Ine older Tor
eign residents tell of their adventures in
the old troublesome days to have any SYM
pathy with those who loudly praise the
good old times" when trifing Journey
was as dangerous as a battlefield, and COM
merce was at the mercy of highwaymep.
This is the era of newspapers, electricity
and Pullman cars. and Mexico is Changing
rapidly for the better. Local preiudicee
are giving way to national feeling. and
BROADER patriotism will soon substitnte
petty proVincialism.
To be Taken Out in Trade.