The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-08-17

req DouleS SHINING out oetOW tHe green
leaves Near them are fields of sugar cane,
and l am told that sugar cane will
grow here from year to year without
replanting for more than twenty years. In
some parts of western Mexico there are said
to be plants which have been cut year after
year for forty years, and which still
thrust out new shoots from the old stumps,
which fairly bubble with saccharine water.
The cattle of this part OF Mexico are fat,
and these green hills are dotted with cows,
sheep and goats. These are generally
watched by halt-naked poems, and every
now and then you pass thatched village
or great hacienda.
SANTA ANNA AND HIS FARM.
We came on dead gallop up to the sta
ton where Santa Anna made his headquar-
tiers on one of these haciendas. He was,
you know, the great general OF the Mexican
army and dictator of the republic, ami Ger.
Scott defeated him at the battle of Cerro
Gordo when he made his march up this road
to the capital Santa Anna owned hundreds
of thousands of acres along this road. We
rode for fifty miles, perhaps, through his
plantations, which have since been divided
up and which are now owned by
other parties. His hacienda is hOl-
low square of long low buildings. with
matched huts surrounding 1t, IN which
live the poor Indians who were prac-
tically his slaves. 1t was here that we ma de
our first change of mules, and the car
stopped for abont five minutes while four
new animals were put in. Then the driver
cracked his whip and away we went at the
rate of twelve miles an hour. As we did so a
freight car, to which was also harnessed
four mules, was side-tracked on a switch 20
let us pass, and behind us came the second
class train galloping away as fast as we
were. Our driver seemed to rejoice in
every fresh team, and he had no mercy on
the steeds. He wore the whitest Of white
duck linen clothes and his pantaloons
clasped his legs after the Mexican stvle
with as close a fit as those OF the ballet
girl. He had a whip twenty feet long, and
his sullen eyes looked out of a handsome
face under a gorgeous yellow hat, whose
brim was pulled down over his eyes, His
whip crack sounded like pistol, and, up
hill or down hill he thrashed his mules,
keeping them on a dead gallop all the time.
He seemed to delight on whipping the mules
as we passed the poems on the road, and he
was the admiration of the dark-eyed Indian
girls who looked at him with great eyes as
we went by. The Indians of the hot lands
are different from those of the Mexican pla-
teau They wear fewer clothes and in
fact some of them wear nothing at all
saw many baked babies, and under one
palm leaf roof half a dozen men slept with
nothing but breeoh clouts on them, and the
sun crawled in through the Sits In the roof
and painted their skins vanished mahog~
any brown. Many of the women were bare
armed and bare bosomed. They all had
long black hair, which hung in braids down
their backs, and some of them, as they
looked out Of their tall matched huts, were
really beautiful.
HOUSES OF FISHING POLES.
The Indians OF Vera Cruz are said TO be
lazy and greater part of this ride was
taken through the state of Vera Cruz The
soil is 80 rich and fruit is so plenty that
they can almost live without working, and
they do no more than they can possibly
help. Their huts are made of canes of about
the size of q fishing pole, and noted that
they were very ingeniously constructed.
Nails are dear in Mexico and these huts
were all tied together.
The poles are driven into the ground and
they extend about five feet upward, making
a circular or square wall of poles fastened
together by other poles, which run around
them and to which they are tied. From
the top of these walls a conical or fiat
ridge roof runs upward. These roofs are
made of palm leaves and fishing poles,
and the thatch of palm is tied to the
poles. The poles of the ground wall are
not always very close together, and you
can see the whole operations Of the family
going on within them. Some Of them have
but one room, and men. women and chill
dren, married and single, sleep and dress
under the same piece Of thatch. Many or
the huts have no doors, and we caught some
uncomfortable sights as we went by. The
people sleep on the ground and they cook
without stoves and the smoke finds its way
out as best it can. Many of the girls are
very pretty and the whole ride was a
Kaleidoscope panorama of ever-ohanging
humanity.
We took our dinner at Rinconado and ate
with dozen Mexican farmers, who wore
their black sombreros at the table. A pretty
Mexican girl, with mantilla around her
head sat opposite me and smoked cigar
cite after her meal. and hungry-eyed In
dians looked curiously into the windows of
the hacienda and watched US eat. As we
left the station we saw a boy blowing in the
jungle and mis- wooden plow was pulled by
oxen, which were harnessed to it
by the horns. Everywhere, in the
fields and in the houses, we saw the
signs OF thesgreat superstition OF the Mexi-
can peasants Most of the corn and wheat
fields had crosses stuck up in them to keep
the devil out Of the crops, and many OF
these matched huts had crosses covered with
flowers and paper stuck in their roofs or in
the ground surrounding them. As we
neared the foot of mountains we found the
vegetation again changed, and we passed
by great trees, from the branches Of which
hung the bean from which tue vanilla ex-
tract Is made and the cocoanuts hung
from the palms. Az we went
on we found more naked children,
and little babies of 2 and 8 toddled
around looking at us with wondering in-
nocent eyes Some OF these were very
pretty, and the sun gilded their bronzed
little bodies and their teeth shone as they
smiled when we went by. l saw pretty girls
smoking cigarettes as they dawdled, half
dressed, outside of these huts under the sun,
ana the half-naked men who lounged round
them were typical of the tropics where the
air and nature invites TO reposs, and
where the chief thing in life is dolce far
niente.
THE OLD NATIONAL ROAD.
We left Jalapa at about Z in the morning
and we reached the end of our journey
about in the afternoon. Allowing two
hours fer stops, we made the seventy-two
miles IN six hours, or an average of twelve
miles an hour, by no means bad record
Tor street cars and mules. During this ride
we used twenty-eight mules and changed
ABOUT every eight miles The ride back
from Vera Cruz to Jalapa is said to take
Twice as long. and the trip will be made in
three hours by the new railroad. The rail-
road trip, however, will not compare in
historic interest or in natural scenery with
tnls ride on the street cars. The journey is
like one taken in a comic table carriage, for
tne track IS smooth and the seats are COM
Portable. The old road over which 1T goes
mas been in existence for hundreds Of years,
ana IL was over it that the Indian peasants
carried their heavy packs of merchandise
before this street car line was built, aud Tor
hundreds OF years all the mule trains and