The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1896-03-20
Sos, 900. 900 In Gold.
Continued from page ID

street behind us. We are in a different
world. The air cool, and fragrant with the
odOr of incense. The light softened and
subdued by the stained glass windows. The
stiffness broken only by softly pattering
footsteps and the faint, almost inaudible,
murmur of many prayers that pervade the
whole building like an echo. There are
kneeling figures in front of the many affairs;
kneeling while the candles burn low; little
girls scarcely old enough to know what a
ing in wide-eyed wonder at the stranger
who looks about, nor kneels or prays. There
are old women absorbed in devotion that
no intrusion can interrupt, and fair sprink-
ling of men. far greater proportion of men,
in fact, than l have ever noticed in any
other country. 1t really seems a sacrilege to
wander about among the kneeling people,
often compelled to step between some wor-
shipper and the altar, but they don't mind it.
They are never ashamed to be seen at prayer
and there is no other way to see the beauties
of the church. really cannot understand
though how people that seems so devout
can be such abominable thieves. Thieves
In small way. 1t is never safe to put
thing down anywhere except in your room,
and then the door must be locked. You
must keep your hand on your watch, purse
and handkerchief and look out for your
other pockets, even while in the great ca
thedral at Mexico.
1t may strike you as strange to be told
that the great refOrmers OF government in
Mexico are not catholics, or churchmen of
any denomination. But it will be very evil
dent why they are not when you know that
all government reforms have been made, not
with the aid of the church, but in spite of it;
and yet some of the early patriots were
priests. The Liberals, as the reformers are
called. have contiscated millions of church
property, suppressed monasteries and nun
neries, and converted church buildings into
state and government offices and schools.
Yet the cathedras are still immensely
wealthy. The one at Guadalajara has sixty
five million dollars on deposit in the Bank
of France, and still receives its tenth from
its wOrshippers, many of whom earn only
twenty-five cents day Mexican money,
equal to about fifteen cents in our money;
and yet venture to believe that there are
no more willing givers among the well.to do
church people of Owosso than these poor
Poems.
Speaking of poor people, Mexico is a para
disc for the poor man, even il he does earn
but fifteen to twenty cents day. He needs
but one suit of cotton, shirt and trousers,
serape or shawl, a sOmbrero and pair of
sandals. The whole outfit need not cost
five dollars. He needs no house, for he can
sleep in the open air the year round. Food
such as he exists on costs but few cents a
day. The PeOn lives only for the present
and has no care for the morrow. No mil
lionaire is more contented than he. We
have seen many ragged people, (more men
than women), an army of beggars that start
out of the ground wherever one stops, but
l haye seen no Mexican suffering from hun
ger and that is after all the most piteous
thing to see people suffering for food as they
do with us, when they are surrounded by
plenty. That seemingly never happens in
Mexico r'-|"
If any reader of these articles should ever
decide to make trip to Mexico let me ad-
wise him to go in the summer and not in the
winter as most tourists do. If you look only
to an escape from the rigors of Michigan
winter then winter is the time to go; but il
you want to see Mexico at her best then
you must 60 in summer. Winter is their
dry season and the ground is as dry and
brown as meadow after rainless summer,
but when the rains come on 1t must be sim
ply beautiful. The valley in which the
City of Mexico is situated is one of the most
beautiful In the world, and yet 1t takes q
stretch of even an elastic imagination to try
and picture the scene as it must have been
when the Spaniards first came over the
mountain wall If you see 1t only In winter.
Today we are far on our journey towards
hohCs VO hdNC iOlb biC tdUl6 lduuS, tu0
beautiful valleys, the adobe huts and the
sombreroed Mexican far behind us. We are
again rushing over the hills and valleys of
the Union. 1t is a delight to see again
broad fields green with spring vegetation
and know that no poor Peon has worked at
a bucket day In and day out to draw the
water that moistens each acre. We are
glad to exchange the palm with its scanty
shade and the cactus with its swollen leaf,
for the broad extending branches of live
oak and cypress. We are glad to see men
who are men even IL they are poor, and
hear the music Of the mother tongue; to see
boys who have too much pride and respect
to present the palm to every stranger and
beg for una centduo.
The land of the palm and the, orange is
all right for novelty, but there is not one of
orr party but looks forward expe jtantly to
slurr bosv,o and mil, oIoJIx ordr~o