El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1897-02-27
OUR MEXICO LETTER
on MANY SUBJECTS OF
INTEREST AND NEWS.
The American Club The American
BOspital-HOb IS in Mexico and
Many Newsy Items.
CITY OF MEXICO, February %.
THE, ANTEDJCA

THE AMERICAN CLUB.
The American Club is great insti-
tuition for Americans in this city. 1t is
strictly a club and is in no wise organ
lied or carried on for the benefit of any
commercial or for the advancement of
any interest commercial. 1t is COM
posed of the best element of the Amer
Jean colony in this capital. Its mem
bership is limited to 800 and it now has
240 members. When visitors arrive
from the states any member can intro
duce them to the club and they can
have the full club privileges for two
weeks, thus giving visitors a chance to
meet all the most prominent Ameri-
cans in the city from whom they can
acquire all the information about the
country and city that they may desire.
The initiation fee TO resident members
is $50 with monthly dues at 50, but
they also carry on their roll Of menu
bership a number of non-residents,
who pay no dues The club is located
in an elegant building on the corner Of
San Francisco and Gante streets, for
which it pays rental OF $40, 900 year.
The first cost of furnishing the club wa
S14, 1000 but since that time many ad-
ditlons have been made. The club is
now free from debt and has a surplus
in the treasury. Its quarters are ele-
CANT and it is the best place in the city
for an American to spend his leisure
1t is fitted out with an elegant bar and
restaurant, billiard tables, reading
rooms, parlor and all the other con-
veniences that go to make the idle
hours of one agreeable and comfortable
with congenial company,
THE AMERICAN HOSPITAL.
This institution is kept up by the
charity of the English sp saking people
of this republic and it is worthy of all
the patronage that can be given it. 1t
is home like in its management and
for the sick American or Euglishman
is a haven of rest in this foreign land
No American or Englishman is turned
from its doors no matter what their
complaint or their condition financially.
1t now has within it's walls 20 charity
patients, people who need assistance
and who could not get it from any
other source in this country. The
charity ward OF the institution is only
intended to hold seven patients, but
the pay wards are now over crowded
with charity patients many Of whom
have come here from the hot lands or
from of the Central American republics
south of here. They come without
means and with barely enough clothing
to hide their neckeduess, and when
they are cured the matrOn of the insti-
tuition tries to furnish them with such
cast off clothing as have been sent to
the institution by Americans for that
purpose. AS | said before, it is an in
stitution worthy of patronage and
Americans in a foreign land would ever
remember the name of the tir-t philan-
trophic American who would endow
the Institution so that it could do even
more than it is now do ng for suffering
Americans in a foreign land.
HOBoS IN MEXICO,
Th. frxv iS f,1lI of hn
drift down here from the cold northern
climate. They infest the streets dur
ing the day time and sleep in the Sta
tion houses at night. Most of them
are the rankest kind and openly pam
handle the resident Americans for
enough to buy pulque with. Some of
them have been here since the summer
and never make any effort to procure
work of any kind and [ doubt if they
would work if they were offered it.
There are also another class of buns
in this country. They are a class of
people who are sent here by their fam!-
lies on account of their drinking pro-
clivities and who are sent a small
amount OF money weekly which is
blown in for booze the same day it is
received and they live on free lunch
and what they can panhandle the other
six days in the week. This is really
the worst class in the country as they
wear good clothes and generally man
age to work some confidence game on
strangers arriving hero to the detri-
ment of the balance of the American
colony living in this repu bile, for man
that has been done up once loses conf
dence in his fellow man always after
! wards.
A queer case of witchcraft is report
ed in this city. Teresa Cardenas, a
young woman of the fashionable suburb
of Tacubaya, has been arrested on COM
plant of Augustine Torres, of the same
| place, on the charge OF witcbcraft.
The. Torres woman alleges that Tere-
sa has placed her under control of evil
spirits, and that she vomits live frogs
| every morning b fore breakfast The
case will be decided in court.
| The epidemic of influenza is reported
as raging in Guadalajara and it is in
creasing to an alarming extent and the
i n m t.r of fata ities tn rOiuh its corn-