San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1893-06-03
SCENES IN WONDERLAND.
A Birds Eye View of the Grand
Scenery on the Line of the Mexi-
can National Railway Be

U1llO, EUC.
LA CONCORDIA, MONTEREY,
May 81, 1898.
To the San Antonio LIGHT:
Tourists bound for this wonder
land, should never leave San AntO-
Mo without subscribing for the
LIGHT, for it is the only paper that
is published in that city that gives
a correst description of Mexico,
her people and the scenery along
the line of her railroads.
In order to see the country be-
tween Monterey and Saltillo, tour
lists should take thetrain that leaves
here at 10 a. m. and arrives at
SaltillO in time for dinner.
AS the train pulls out from
Monterey it will pass through
fields of corn and sugar cane;
round the Sierra Ohispado which
is on the left, and the Sierra de la
Metra on the right; across irrigat-
ing bitches whose banks are lined
with cane brake, pecan and wal
nut trees; cross the sparkling wa
tiers of the Rio San Juan; rusheS
by Mexican houses and jacals, and
the Roberto Law cotton mill until
it arrives at the LeOna statiOns
eight miles from Monterey. But as
the train only stops long enough
to put off and take on passengers,
and as the town is two miles away
only the church steeples and fac
tories are in sight.
The next station is Santa Catar-
ina four miles away, but before
reaching it the train will pass a
siding on the right from which
there is an air steel cable wire rope
that leads from it to the San An
tonic silver and lead mines, which
are situated two miles up on the
Sierra de la Metra, the property of
the Gugganheims of Monterey.
They haul the ores down in buck
cts on the air cable and drop them
into the cars on the sidings.
The city of Santa Catarina is
three miles off to the left, and is
one of the most romantic places in
this wonderland. 1t is built at the
mouth of canyon, under the
shadow of the Rockies, whose
sierried peaks rise thousands of feet
above it, and whose sides are
pierced with caves and caverns
where the bats and the night owls
find a hiding place during the day.
But as the conductor gives the
signal to the engineer, he pulls out,
and the train rusheS up the valley
toward Garcia. But before it goes
far the tourist will have an oppor-
tunity of looking through hole in
the mountain.
About ten miles off is lofty
mountain and away up toward one
of its highest points the hole above
referred to can be seen. AS it has
never been satisfactorily explained
how that hole came to be there,
and as your correspondent knows
all about this wonderland
he has been requested to tell the
readers of the LIGHT how it came
there. 1t occurred in this way:
Duringsth war of 1917 land when
General Taylor was marching from
going up that valley, a Frenchman
by the name of PatriciO
O'Daugherty, who had charge of a
battery of artillery, saw a Mexican
buzzard perched on top Of it which
he took to be the Mexican eagle,
and he could not resist the tempta-
ton of taking a shot at it. He
or Of
with a round ball and blaZed
away, missed the buzzuard but
shot a hole clean through the
mountain. Sabe?
While the tourists are gazing
at the mountain scenery that sur
rounds them on every side, the
iron horse is rushing onward and
Garcia, or rather the station {;
for the city is three miles
off to the right, and only the
church steeples and a few white
washed stone houses are in sight.
But it is not so with some OF the
citizens, for many of them come to
the depot with baskets of figs,
peaches, pluIlS, pears, pollleSrdn-
ates, dulces and the sweetest bo-
quets of flowers, which bud and
bloom the year around in this
Jmi-tropical country.
After the train leaves Garcia it
dives into the mountains, over
deep precipices, under Overhanging
cliffs, until it reaches Los Sieras,
where the mountains come so close
that thew kiss each other From